
Class SL^^^nJ^ 

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OLD GEOEGETOWN 



(DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA) 






BY 



HUGH T. TAGGART 



Keprinted from the 
Kecords of the Columbia Histobical Society, Vol. 11, 1908 



Press of 

The New Era printing Compamt 

Lancaster, pa. 






Gift 



CONTENTS. 

Page. 

Early Navigators of the Potomac 3 

Spanish Mission at Occoqiian 4 

Analostan or My Lord's Island 10 

The Anacostan Indians 12 

The Indian Town of Tohogae 16 

/ Grants of Land and Creation of Counties Along the River 18 

/ Plantation Life 22 

/ Courts and La^\'yers 25 

\ The Corporation Court or Mayor's Court 29 

"^""vA Doctor's Bill in Colonial Days 30 

Early Settlers and the Tobacco Trade 32 

Saw Pit Landing at the Mouth of Rock Creek 36 

The Original Survey and Plan of the Town 39 

Erection of the Towa Wharf 42 

Fairs in the Town 44 

Braddock's Expedition 46 

;. Robert Peter and Thomas Richardson' Merchants. Troubles over 

the Ferry, the Stamp Act and the Importation of Tea 48 

Early Hopes of Commercial Greatness 56 

Flour Inspectors and Ineir Oaths of Office 64 

The Town in the Daj^s of the Revolution 67 

; After the War 73 

Georgetown's Former Merchant Alarine 75 

The To^^Tl Incorporated 82 

Washington Unaccommodating and Georgetown Sarcastic 87 

A Yellow Fever Scare 90 

The Founding of the City of Washington 91 

Major L'Enfant 95 

\- Tlie Establishment of the National Capital Causes Distress to the 

Landowners 100 

The Story of Yarrah 102 



111 



OLD GEORGETOWN. 

By HUGH T. TAGGART. 
(Read before the Society, May 13, 1907.) 

George-Town, ''on the Patowmack," was ushered 
jnJQ-BTr st cnGO undor an A ct of t he Gtme r^ Assembly "of 
Maryland, passed m the year 1751, a quarter of a cen^ 
"Tury" before — th^^pfovince ceased to be a loyal de- 
pendency of the British Crown : it progressed and pros- 
pered to such an extent that the rank and dignity of 
an incorporated city was conferred upon it, in the year 
1789, by the General Assembly of the independent 
State; soon thereafter it became a part of the district 
which was selected by President Washington for the 
permanent seat of the Federal Government, under the 
authority of an act of cession by the State to the United 
States. This district, designated originally the "Ter- 
ritory of Columbia," became known later as the "Dis- 
trict of Columbia." 

As town and city, it existed for a period of one 
hundred and twenty years, during which it was under 
the dominion successively of three sovereigns, the King 
of Great Britain, the State of Maryland and the United 
States. Its charter was repealed in the year 1871, by an 
Act of Congress which provided for a municipal gov- 
ernment with jurisdiction over the entire District of Co- 
lumbia; the act, however, provided that that portion of 
the District which was within the limits of the former 
municipality should still continue to be known as the 
City of Georgetown, and that its laws and ordinances 
should continue in force until repealed ; but by the sweep- 
ing provisions of a further Act of Congress, passed in 



2 Old Georgetown. 

1895, even these remnants of its legal identity were 
obliterated and so far as it was possible to accomplish 
it by legislation that identity was destroyed. The act 
declared "the title and existence of Georgetown as a 
separate and independent city by law" to be abolished; 
and that all that portion of the District embraced 
within the bounds of and constituting the city of 
Georgetown should be no longer known "by the name 
and title in law of the City of Georgetown, but the same 
shall be known and shall constitute a part of the City 
of Washington, the Federal Capital;" all general laws, 
ordinances and regulations of the City of Georgetown 
were repealed and the general laws, ordinances and 
reg-ulations of the City of Washington substituted for 
them, and it provided that the nomenclature of the 
streets of Georgetown and the numbering of its 
squares or blocks should be made to conform to those 
of the City of Washington. 

The changes effected by this legislation of Congress 
have been such that there is, at the present time, little 
or nothing to indicate to the casual observer that a 
city had existed on the west side of Rock Creek, for 
almost half a century, before the City of Washington 
was located; nevertheless, the annals of the city that 
was must always form an interesting chapter in the 
history of the National Capital of which it now forms 
part, and in that of the District of Columbia, within 
which both cities existed, side by side, for eighty 
years. 

Georgetown, from the historical standpoint, seems 
to have been a neglected subject until the year 1859. 
In that year the Rev. Thomas B. Balch delivered two 
lectures under the title of "Reminiscences of George- 
town, D. C," which were printed: and in the year 1878 
Mr. R. P. Jackson published the ' ' Chronicles of George- 



Old Georgetown. 3 

town." Both of these gentlemen have paid the debt 
of nature, leaving the community under a debt of grati- 
tude to them for having rescued from oblivion and per- 
petuated many facts in the history of the town. 

While in the present contribution a number of facts 
m the early history of Georgetown have been collected 
which may be added to those related by the gentlemen 
named, and this was mainly its purpose, the scope of 
the paper has been enlarged by the mention of events, 
some of which happened in this region before George- 
town became a speck on the landscape of the continent, 
and all of which have a bearing more or less direct 
upon the history of the entire District of Columbia. 
The narrative of these facts and events is given with- 
out special regard to orderly method in their presenta- 
tion, and without attempt at rhetorical embellishment 
or literary finish, but, notwithstanding the writer 
realizes its shortcomings in these and other respects, 
he is consoled in some degree by an observation of Pro- 
fessor Freeman in the introduction to his work on 
American Institutional History "that even the re- 
searches of the dullest antiquary have their use." 

Early Navigators of the Potomac, 

The honor is popularly ascribed to Captain John 
Smith of having been the first man of European race 
to explore the Potomac River, and to contemplate in 
the region which includes the site of the District of 
Columbia, the wealth of forest, flowers, animal life and 
other glories displayed by nature before she had felt 
the withering touch of civilization; yet there is noth- 
ing in the writings of Smith to indicate that his ex- 
ploration of the river had been extended to the vicinity 
of the first or Little Falls. He makes no mention of 



4 Old Georgetown. 

this absolute barrier to further navigation; it is, in 
fact, apparent from his map that this portion of the 
river was laid down upon it from narration and not 
from actual exploration. 

It seems also to be historically demonstrable that he 
had been preceded many years before by the Spaniards, 
who had sailed up the river at least as far as the place 
we now know as Occoquan, and that to the river they 
had given the name of Espiritu Santo. 

It is an interesting story gleaned from the Spanish 
archives by Buckingham Smith and narrated by Shea, 
the Catholic historian, in a paper read by him before the 
New York Historical Society, several years ago. A 
tall, well-formed brave, the brother of a native chief- 
tain, who was the ruler of Axacan, upon the occasion 
of a visit to the river by a Spanish vessel, was per- 
suaded by the Spaniards to accompany them upon 
their return to Mexico, which, at the time, had been 
conquered and was under the government of the Vice- 
roy, Don Luis de Velasco. 

The Indian from the shores of the Potomac upon his 
arrival at the City of Mexico was taken under the 
Viceroy's patronage and was solemnly and with great 
pomp baptized in the Cathedral; he took the name of 
his patron, was educated in the Spanish language and 
instructed in the Christian religion, and in the course 
of time was sent to Spain, where he spent several years. 

In the year 15G6 the famous Spanish admiral, Pedro 
Melendez, dispatched a vessel bearing thirty soldiers 
and two Dominican fathers to establish a station at 
Axacan. This party, having no taste for a laborious 
mission and becoming alarmed over anticipated dan- 
gers, forced the captain to return; then the Jesuits 
resolved to embark in the enterj^rise which had been 
abandoned by the Dominicans and four years later 



Old Georgetown. $ 

Father Segura, Vice-Provincial, accompanied by some 
younger members of the society, set sail for Axacan, 
at which they arrived on September 10, 1570. The 
Indian, Luis de Velasco, at this time well advanced in 
years and a man,. grave and intelligent, thoroughly con- 
versant with Spanish affairs and to all appearances a 
sincere Christian and friend of the Spaniards, had vol- 
unteered to accompany the missionaries and made every 
promise as to the security of their persons. 

It was thought that with the presence, active interest 
and support of Luis, no guards would be needed, and 
as soldiers would be a detriment to the mission, the mis- 
sionaries determined to trust themselves entirely in the 
hands of the Indians. For a time after their arrival 
Luis remained with them, but, being once more upon 
his native heath, his original nature reasserted itself; 
his old instincts and habits returned ; the veneer of his 
Christian civilization proved to be but thin and easily 
effaced; ''he became Indian with the Indians rather 
than Spanish with the Spaniards," and he finally for- 
sook the missionaries altogether. 

The latter being reduced to great straits for food 
during the winter, three of their number were sent to 
make a last appeal to Luis for assistance. He made 
many excuses for his absence and sought to beguile 
them with promises. As they were departing sadly 
from the Indian village, convinced of his insincerity, 
they were attacked and slain and their bodies horribly 
mutilated by the savages. Four days after this, Luis, 
arrayed in the gown of one of the murdered priests, 
and attended by his brother and a war party, armed 
with clubs and bows, appeared before the quarters of 
the survivors, who knelt at their rude altar and calmly 
awaited their fate; at a signal from Luis they were 
massacred. The bodies of Father John Baptiste Se- 



6 Old Georgetoicn. 

gura, Brothers Gabriel Gomez, Peter D. Linares, Sancho 
Lorallos and Christopher Redondo, and of their Indian 
attendants, who were also slain, were buried beneath 
their chapel. 

In the spring a vessel bearing supplies for the mis- 
sionaries anchored off Axacan; the Indians sought to 
lure on shore those on board by pointing to men arrayed 
in the garb of the missionaries, standing some distance 
away; but treachery was suspected from the fact that 
these did not apj^roach nearer and join in the demon- 
strations of welcome. The Spaniards weighed anchor 
and sailed away, taking with them two of the Indians 
whom they had seized and from whom the fate of the 
missionaries was learned. 

Melendez, having heard the report, sailed at once for 
the Bay of St. Mary's, as the Chesapeake was called by 
his countrymen, for the purpose of chastising the mur- 
derers ; he ran up the Espiritu Santo or Potomac and 
landed with a band of armed men, unfurled the flag of 
Spain and pursued and captured many of the Indians. 
To them he announced that he would not harm the 
innocent and demanded that Luis be delivered up; but 
that fiend had fled to the mountains. Eight others, who 
had been concerned in the killing, were sent by Melendez 
on board his vessel and hung at the yard arm. ''After 
this summaiy piece of justice, ' ' says Shea, ' ' the founder 
of St. Augustine, with his mail-clad force, embarked 
and the Spanish flag floated for the last time over the 
land of Axacan." He adds: "So ends the history of 
the first settlement of white men on the soil of Virginia. 
The walls of the Capitol at Washington might well be 
adorned with a painting of a scene which occurred 
almost in sight of its dome— the founder of St. Augus- 
tine, the butcher of Ribault, the chosen commander of 
the Invincible Armada, as he stood, surrounded by his 



Old Georgetown. 7 

grim warriors, planting the standard of Spain on the 
banks of the Potomac. ' ' 

Later researches indicate that there was a still earlier 
settlement of white meii in Virginia than that made in 
the year 1570 at Axacan on the Potomac. 

A great exposition is in progress to-day at Hampton 
Roads in commemoration of the three hundredth anni- 
versary of the English settlement at Jamestown, but 
even here the English seem to have been preceded by 
the Spaniards. The Century Dictionary and Cyclo- 
pedia (1894-5) states that on May 13, 1607, the first 
permanent English settlement in the United States, 
situated on the James Eiver, in James City County, 
Virginia, was made upon the site of the Spanish settle- 
ment of San Miguel, founded by Lucas Vasqueth de 
Ayllon, and who died there on October 18, 1526. 
Ayllon, it is said, was a Spanish lawyer and a Judge 
of the Audience of Santo Domingo from 1509. 

' ' In 1519, he was sent by the Audience to Cuba, to prevent 
Velasqueth, Governor of that island, from interfering with 
the expedition of Cortes in Mexico, but was unsuccessful. In 
1520, he secured a license to explore the coast of Florida, and 
sent a caravel there under the command of Gordilla. Satis- 
fied by his reports, Ayllon went to Spain, received a royal 
Cedula to explore and settle eight hundred leagues of coast, 
and, after sending a preliminary expedition under Pedro de 
Quexos (1525), he sailed for Hispaniola in June, 1526, with 
three ships and people for a colony. After running along the 
coast, he fixed his settlement called San Miguel, where the 
EngHsh afterwards founded Jamestown, Virginia. There he 
died of a fever, and quarrels in the colony led to its abandon- 
ment. ' ' 

From "The Catholic Church in Colonial Days," one 
of Mr. Shea's works, it appears that the vessels of 



8 Old Geor get oxen. 

Ayllon carried '*six hundred persons of both sexes with 
abundant supplies and horses ' ' ; that entering the Capes 
of the Chesapeake, he ascended a river and established 
a colony at Guandape, giving it the name of St. 
Michael, "the spot being by the testimony of Ecija, 
pilot-in-chief of Florida, that, where the English sub- 
sequently founded Jamestown." 

Ecija, Pilot Mayor of Florida, whose office had pos- 
session of the Spanish charts and derroteros of the 
coast, was sent in 1609 to discover what the English 
were doing. 

In regard to the mission on the Potomac, Mr. Shea 
states that no document exists by which the precise 
location of Axacan is shown, but he advances several 
reasons in favor of the theory that it was at Occoquan, 
the principal one of which is the resemblance of the 
latter name to the Spanish Axacan. In addition to the 
reasons given by him there are others which tend to 
establish almost conclusively the correctness of this 
theory as to the location. 

The grammarians inform us that the letter" j" in the 
Spanish has always a guttural sound, like the English 
"h" strongly aspirated, and like the guttural sound of 
"ch" in the German words "nacht" and "nicht"; and 
that the letter "x" in the old Spanish had two very dif- 
ferent sounds : the one exactly the same as the Spanish 
"j" and the other that of the English "x" in "tax." 
Thus, though in Spanish "Mejico" is the common 
spelling of "Mexico" and "Tejas" that of "Texas," 
the pronunciation would be' the same if the words 
were spelled either way. If we apply the rule to 
Axacan we have "Ajacan," Ar/iacan which makes such 
a close approach to Occoquan as to be almost identical 
in sound. 

Furthennore, Occoquan appears to be a corruption 



Old Georgetown. 9 

in a slight degree of Achaquin, in which latter name we 
easily recognize the Spanish Ajacan. I have in my 
possession a map showing the Potomac River and its 
tributary streams, prepared by Moll, a London geogra- 
pher, and, although it bears no date, there is reason to 
believe that it made its appearance early m the first 
half of the eighteenth century. Upon this map the 
name of Occoquan, as we spell it now, does not 
appear, but a stream is located upon it relatively about 
where Occoquan should be, which stream bears the 
name of "Achaquin." 

There are other features of this map worthy of note : 
upon it the Anacostia River or Eastern Branch is indi- 
cated, but it is not named; the main river above the 
mouth of the Anacostia is shown upon it as a long but 
otherwise insignificant stream, to which is given the 
unromantic but suggestive name of ''Turkey Buzzard 
Run"; to the point at the Arsenal is given the name of 
''Turkey Buzzard Point"; that point continued to be 
known as "Turkey Buzzard Point" down to the time 
when the federal capital was laid out; it then became 
known as "Young's Point," taking the name from 
Notley Young, the owner of the land ; it was later called 
"Greenleaf's Point," after James Greenleaf, a large 
purchaser of lots in the new city, many of which were 
located in its vicinity ; finally it took the name it now 
bears, Arsenal Point, from the military uses to which 
it was put by the government. 

Two islands appear on this map in Turkey Buzzard 
Run, just above its confluence with the Anacostia, which 
are called the "Anacostian Islands"; one of these we 
have no difficulty in recognizing as the present Ana- 
lostan or Mason's Island, and the other as the island 
which formerly existed at the Virginia end of the Long 
Bridge, called at one time "Holmes' Island" and later 
"Alexander's Island." 



lO Old Georgetoivn. 

In this connection I may add that several years ago 
I saw in the clerk's office of Fairfax Count}^ Court a 
plat which it is probable had been prepared prior to 
the Revolutionary^ War with the object of enlightening 
the Court as to the pretensions of the parties to an 
ejectment suit, and which showed a profile of the river 
on the Virginia side from a point below the Four Mile 
Run as far up as the present Aqueduct Bridge. Upon 
the map the two islands are delineated: the lower one 
bears the name of ''Holmes' Island" and the one above 
it, viz., Analostan or Mason's Island, bears the name 
of ''My Lord's Island." AATiether the latter took this 
name from "My Lord Baltimore," the owner under 
the patent for Maryland of the land on this side of the 
river, or from "My Lord Fairfax," the owner under 
the patent for the Northern Neck of Virginia of the 
land on the other side, might be made the subject of 
a curious historical controversy involving the ancient, 
long-continued and but recently settled dispute between 
Maryland and Virginia as to the boundaiy line between 
them on the Potomac. The records of the Virginia 
Land Office show that as early as the year 1669, the 
island was so known. On October 21 of that year a 
patent was issued to Robert Howsing (Howson), for 
a tract of 6,000 acres described as lying "in the 
freshes" of the Potomac River and as having for its 
beginning a red oak standing by a small branch or run 
nearly opposite an island ' ' commonly called and known 
by the name of My Lord's Island." 

Analostan Island obtained still another name, viz., 
"Barbadoes," through a survey made of it by the 
colonial authorities of Maryland for Captain Randolph 
Brandt on the twenty-ninth day of April, 1682, and 
through the patent granted to him for it by Lord Balti- 
more. It is described in the certificate of survey and 



Old Georgetown. ii 

patent as "an island lying in the Potomac Eiver over 
against Rock Creek, in Charles County, commonly 
called or known by the name of Analostian Island, con- 
taining by estimation seventy-five acres. To be held 
of Zachiah Manor, called Barbadoes. ' ' 

On the Rent Rolls of Lord Baltimore the tract is car- 
ried as ''Barbadoes" and is described as an island 
commonly called "Anacostian Island"; from which it 
appears that in early days it went indifferently by 
either name, "Analostian" or "Anacostian." 

It passed into the possession of George Mason by a 
deed from Francis Hammersley dated August 28, 
1777, hence the name "Mason's Island." 

To whom "Turkey Buzzard Point" was first in- 
debted for its name cannot now be ascertained, but the 
name had its origin prior to the year 1673, for it so 
appears upon the map published in that year, prepared 
by Augustine Herman, a Bohemian, and one of the early 
settlers upon the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Upon 
Herman's map Occoquan appears as "Achquin," the 
middle a having been doubtless inadvertently omitted. 
The name appears again as "Achquivin" on a map in 
Speed's "Theater of the Empire of Great Britain," 
published in 1676. These and other old maps preserved 
in the Congressional Library present a seductive field 
of investigation to the student of local history; but it 
is impracticable to consider them in greater detail in 
a condensed sketch, such as the present occasion will 
only admit. 

I shall mention but one other— Senex's map of 1719 
—inscribed to the Earl of Orkney and published in 
London in a work entitled "A New General Atlas, '^ 
between pages 240 and 241, and to this reference is 
made for the purpose of correcting an apparently erro- 
neous impression which prevails as to the location of 



12 Old Georgetown. 

the town of the Anacostan Indians. Neill and others, 
to whom we are indebted for sketches of the early his- 
tory of Mar^^and and Virginia, locate these Indians 
upon and near the site of the city of Washington ; and 
the fact that the river which still bears their name is 
on the Maryland side of the Potomac would seem to 
strongly support the propriety of thus locating them. 
Senex's map locates them, however, on the Virginia 
side of the river, and that he is right in so doing is 
apparently confirmed by the act of the Assembly of 
Virginia passed in 1653, prescribing the bounds of 
Westmoreland County, in that province, viz., ''from 
Machoactoke River, where Mr. Cole lives; and so up- 
wards to the falls of the great river of Patowomeke 
above the Necostin's towne." 

From another established fact it is to be infen-ed that 
subsequently the tribe or a remnant of it had removed 
from the Virginia to the Maryland side of the Potomac. 
There is recorded among the land records of the Dis- 
trict of Columbia a deed dated December 21, 1793, from 
William Berry Warman to James Greenleaf for part 
of a tract called Bayley's Purchase; the land conveyed 
by the deed is described as beginning at a stone fixed 
on the east side of the Eastern Branch of Potomac 
River ''a little above the place where formerly stood 
the Anacostin Fort and opposite a cove called Ana- 
costin Cove." 

At the time Georgetown was laid out in 1751, the 
Anacostan Indians had disapj^eared from its vicinity, 
for no mention of them is to be found in its annals; 
they were then a lost tribe and were either extinct or 
had been forced by the advancing tide of white settlers 
towards the upper Potomac and had been incorporated 
with the Indians of that region. 

But to return to Captain John Smith: although, as 



Old Georgetown. ^3 

we have seen, that remarkable man was not the first 
European to reach this locality, nor even the first to 
enter the Potomac, his name must be forever famous 
by reason of his importance as a factor in the events 
which marked the origin and preserved the germ of 
what developed and grew in part on its shore into one 
of the greatest and most glorious of American com- 
monwealths -the State of Virginia. No sketch which 
involves a mention of the early navigators of the river 
would be complete without some notice of him. 

Smith made his appearance in the colony of Virginia 
when the first settlers had become feeble from climatic 
causes and dispirited from internal troubles and by the 
constant menaces of the powerful Indian tribes under 
Powhatan ; and by his finnness, courage, tact and ability 
he often saved them from destruction. 

On June 2, 1608, Smith left the English settlement on 
the James, in an open boat, to explore the upper part 
of the Chesapeake Bay. He was accompanied by four- 
teen others, seven of whom are described as "gentle- 
men" and seven as "souldiers." His intention was to 
coast along the Eastern Shore on the way up, and along 
the Western Shore on his return ; but after several days 
he was compelled to abandon the Eastern Shore and to 
cross to the other side, on account of the difficulty of 
obtaining good drinking water. After being out twelve 
or fourteen days his men, tired with labor at the oars, 
and their bread spoiled with water to the degree of 
rottenness, became discouraged and importuned him 
to return, stating their fears that they would be lost 
"in these unknown large waters or be swallowed up 
in some stormy gust." He chided them for their fears, 
exhorted them to regain their spirits, and asserted that 
he would not return until he had found the head of the 
waters they "conceited to be endless." Lack of wind 



14 Old Gcorgeto-wn. 

and the sickness of several of the men compelled Smith, 
against his inclination, to abandon for the time being 
the further exploration of the bay; returning, they 
came to the mouth of the Potomac on the sixteenth of 
June ; and the sick having recovered and being curious 
to learn something of, that ' ' seven mile broad river, ' ' 
they sailed up it according to Smith's narrative for 
more than thirty miles ; this would have brought them 
to about Colonial Beach or a short distance beyond. 
Several of the Indian towns on the Potomac which are 
shown on Smith's map can be located with reasonable 
certainty, but the situation of the rest is a matter of 
conjecture purely. The map would indicate that he 
penetrated on this or another occasion as far perhaps 
as Indian Head. 

There is a slight reason for the belief that the French 
had also preceded Smith in the navigation of the bay, 
and perhaps of the Potomac. 

Parkman, in his ''Pioneers of New France," in a 
footnote on page 208, states that, "In 1565 and for 
some years previous, bison skins were brought by the 
Indians down the Potomac, and thence came along 
shore in canoes to the French above the Gulf of St. 
Lawrence. During two years six thousand skins were 
thus obtained." He cites as authority for this state- 
ment manuscript letters of Menendez to Philip II. of 
Spain. 

In view of the immense stretch of rough and surf- 
beaten sea coast, in part rock-bound, from the mouth 
of the Chesai)eake to the mouth of the St. Lawrence, 
and the troublesome character of the navigation to 
vessels of larger size, it is incredible that the Potomac 
Indians made the trip in their simple canoes weighted 
with heavy skins. If there was trading between them 
and the French in skins, as is probable, the vessels of 



Old Georgetown. 15 

the latter must have received the freight from the 
Indians in the river itself. 

Of the accounts left by the early navigators of the 
Potomac, that of Captain Henry Fleete is the most sat- 
isfactory, but even this, in many interesting particulars, 
is obscure and uncertain. He was undoubtedly the 
first European to ascend the river past the site of 
Georgetown and to reach the Little Falls. Although 
his career was not as varied as that of Smith, it was 
quite adventurous and romantic. In the fall of 1621 
the pinnace "Tiger," under Spilman, an experienced 
navigator, with twenty- six men, Fleete being among the 
number, was sent from Jamestown to the upper Po-» 
tomac to trade with the Indians for corn. Spilman 
landed with twenty-one men among the Anacostans. 
The five men who remained on board were attacked by 
the Indians, who were repulsed by the discharge of a 
cannon; those on shore were all killed except Fleete; 
he remained with the Indians a number of years, 
learned their language and almost forgot his own, was 
finally ransomed and returned to England, where he 
regaled the people with wonderful stories of his cap- 
tivity. He stated that he had been within sight of the 
South Seas; had seen the Indians besprinkle their 
paintings with powder of gold, had seen rare precious 
stones among them and great quantities of rich fur. 
He enlisted the interest of some London merchants, by 
whom he was despatched in a vessel to trade in the 
river. The manuscript of a journal of the voyage, kept 
by him, is preserved in the library of the Archbishop 
of Canterbury, at Lambeth, and was first presented to 
the American reader by Neill in his "English Coloni- 
zation in America." From this it appears that on 
July 4, 1631, the vessel sailed from the Downs, and 
arrived on the New England coast on September 9 



i6 Old Georgetown. 

following; thence it sailed on the nineteenth, arriving 
on October 26 in the Potomac, where a cargo of corn 
was obtained with which it returned to New England. 
On May 21 of the following year Fleete again arrived 
at the mouth of the river. He beat about the river for 
several days, going from one place to another in search 
of furs, visiting among other tribes the Anacostans, by 
whom he had been held captive some years before. 
Having heard of several populous Indian towns above 
the falls, on June 14 he dispatched his brother and two 
trusty Indians with presents for the kings, consisting 
of beads, bells, hatchets, knives, etc., and with instruc- 
tions to bring the Indians to the falls where they would 
find him and the ship. 

"On Monday, the 25th of June," says Fleete, "we set sail 
for the town of Tohogae, when we came to an anchor about 
two leagues short of the Falls, being in the latitude 41, on 
the 26th of June. This place without all question is the most 
pleasant and healthful place in all this country, and most 
convenient for habitation, the air temperate in summer and 
not violent in winter. It aboundeth with all manner of fish. 
The Indians in one night will catch thirty sturgeons in a place 
where the river is not above twelve fathoms broad. And as 
for deer, buffaloes, bears, turkeys, the woods do swarm with 
them, and the soil is exceedingly fertile." 

On the twenty-seventh of June he says he manned his 
shallop "and went up with the flood, the tide rising 
about four feet in height at this place, ' ' and that they 
had not rowed above three miles "before they could 
hear the falls roar not above six miles distant, by which 
it appears that the river is separated with rocks, but 
only in that one place, for beyond is a fair river." 
Due allowance being made for the uncertainty of 
Fleete 's estimatexSof distance, which were mere guess- 



Old Georgetown. ^7 

work, there can be no mistaking the locality of which 
he speaks. Georgetown evidently arose upon the ashes 
of Tohogae, the Indian town, and those who have had 
any experience in fishing in the river above will have 
no difficulty in locating the place where the Indians 
caught the sturgeon, as a point just above the stone 
house and mill constructed by Amos Cloud towards the 
close of the eighteenth century. This house was the 
residence of the late John W. Frizzel, more familiarly 
known among his acquaintances by the nickname of 
"Bull," and the mill in recent years has been generally 
known as Edes Mill. 

Soon after this voyage Fleete proved to be of great 
service to Governor Calvert and his company in the 
establishment of the Maryland Colony. Under his 
guidance the colonists were conducted to the Indian 
town of Yoacomoco, which had been one of his trading 
posts. This was purchased from the Indians and on 
the twenty-seventh of March, 1634, the colonists took 
possession and named the place St. Mary's; and here, 
under mutual promises of friendship and peace between 
the settlers and the Indians, the foundations of another 
great state were laid, within which Georgetown had its 
birth and to which it was long united by ties of interest 
and atfection; in whose glories it shared and under 
which it enjoyed a high degree of commercial pros- 
perity prior to the time when the exigencies of national 
politics transferred it to the care of that '^paternal but 
irresponsible sovereign," the Congress of the United 

States. 

The wise and benignant rule of the first Lords Pro- 
prietaries of Maryland has been justly extolled. The 
expectation of pecuniary gain was undoubtedly the 
main object of their outlays of money and efforts to 
settle the colony; nevertheless, their conduct of affairs 



1 8 Old Georgetown. 

was just and generous to the people and not unduly 
subordinated to that end. The spirit by which they 
were actuated and their hopes of the future are admir- 
ably illustrated in a letter dated August 20, 1649, written 
by one of them from London to the General Assembly 
of the Province. In this letter he animadverts upon a 
disposition shown by some to raise jealousies and dis- 
contents between himself and the people of the colony, 
and claims that he has given sufficient testimony of his 
desire to promote by all fitting means their happiness 
and welfare, and he concludes by saying, ' '■ By concord 
and union a small colony may grow into a great and 
renowned nation, whereas by experience it is found that 
by discord and dissension great and glorious kingdoms 
and commonwealths decline and come to nothing." 
This letter is also significant as containing the first 
suggestion of ''a great and renowned nation," as the 
outcome of colonization in America. 

Geants of Land and Creation of Counties Along the 

River. 
Lord Baltimore was, by the charter which he received 
from the English king, practically made the absolute 
owner of the land in Maryland, and he formulated regu- 
lations for its disposition which were called ** Condi- 
tions of Plantations." Under these, numerous grants 
of land along the river were made at an early day ; and 
as the tide of settlement gradually extended upwards, 
and as the number and convenience of the population 
required, counties were created and courts and officers 
provided for them. Charles County, which was created 
in 1658, included the territory along the Potomac from 
the mouth of the Wicomico ' ' as high as the settlements 
extend ' ' ; and in 1695 Mattawoman Creek was made the 
upper boundary of Charles ; and of the territor}' above 



Old Georgetown. 19 

it, along the river, a new county was made under the 
name of Prince George's. 

Governor Nicholson's commission appointing jus- 
tices of the peace for the county of Prince George's, 
which is dated April 26, 1696, and which authorized the 
holding by them of a county court, is a curious docu- 
ment ; it would seem from it that either the governor or 
the people, or both, believed that the "Hoodoo" or 
''Voodoo" man was abroad in the land; for among 
other duties solemnly enjoined by this instrument upon 
the justices was the duty of inquiring by the oaths of 
good and lawful men of their county ''of all and all 
manner of Felonies, Witchcrafts, Inchantments, Sor- 
ceries, Magic Arts, ' ' etc. 

The court divided the County into hundreds, one of 
which, extending from Oxon Branch (opposite Alex- 
andria) to the Falls of the Potomac, and which in- 
cluded the present District of Columbia, was called 
VNew Scotland Hundred"; of this, Daniel Ebbett was 
appointed constable; Charles Beall, pressmaster, and 
Francis Prisley, overseer of highways. 

In 1748 Frederick County was created out of the 
upper part of Prince George's, with a line for its 
boundary "beginning at the lower side of the mouth 
of Rock Creek, thence by a straight line, joining to 
the east side of Seth Hyatt's plantation to Patuxent 
Eiver. " 

Scharf, the Maryland historian, thinks it probable 
that the first settlements in Frederick County were 
made in the vicinity of Georgetown, which for a long 
time was the chief mart and only seaport of the county. 
Among the earlier grants of land in this section were 
^'Blue Plains," across the Eastern Branch, surveyed 
for George Thompson in 1662; "St. Elizabeth," upon 
which is located the Government Hospital for the 



20 Old Georgetown. 

Insane; and ' ' Giesborougli, " surveyed in 1663; ''Dud- 
dington Manor," one thousand acres; ''New Troy," 
five hundred acres, and ''Duddington Pasture," three 
hundred acres, were granted to George Thompson, 
February 12, 1663. The three last named tracts fell 
wholly within the limits of the City of Washington 
when it was laid out. "The Widow's Mite,\/' six 
hundred acres, was surveyed for John Langworth in 
1664; this tract extended in the form of a parallelo- 
gram from the river at the old Observatory grounds, 
in a northerly direction, and the greater portion of 
it was included in the City of Washington. "The 
Father's Gift," five hundred acres, was granted to 
Richard and William Pinner in 1668. It was located 
on the river west of Tiber Creek. "St. Philip and 
Jacob," four hundred acres, was granted to Philip 
Lines in 1675. This tract was on the river above 
Georgetown. "Girls' Portion," one thousand seven 
hundred and seventy-six acres, was patented to Colonel 
Henry Darnell in 1688. "AVliite Haven," seven hun- 
dred and fifty-nine acres, was surveyed in 1689 for 
John Addison and William Hutchinson on the river 
above Georgetown. "The Vineyard," one hundred 
and fifty acres, between Rock Creek and the old Ob- 
servatory grounds, was granted to William Hutchin- 
son in 1696. "Beall's Levels," two hundred and 
twenty-five acres, was granted to Colonel Ninian Beall 
in 1703. A portion of this tract, with some vacant 
ground added, was the property of David Burnes, one 
of the original proprietors of land in the City of 
W^ashington. It was patented to him on a re-survey 
in 1774, as the eldest son and heir at law of his father, 
James Burnes, for whom it was re-sun^eyed in 1769, 
and who had died before obtaining the patent. eTanies 
Burnes, the father of David, occupied the land as a 



Old Georgetown. 21 

tenant for two years before purchasing it from Henry 
Massey. Between the year 1700 and the outbreak of 
the Revolutionary War, numerous other grants were 
made under the names of "Plain Dealing," "Success," 
"Little Chance," "Flint's Discovery," "Addition to 
Flint's Discovery," "Fortune," "Allison's Forest," 
' ' Allison 's Forest Enlarged, " " James ' Gift, " " Orme 's 
Luck," "Eock of Dumbarton," "Addition to Rock of 
Dumbarton, " " Beall 's Lot, " " Gift, " " Beall 's Plains, ' ' 
"Fellowship," "Poor Tom's Last Shift," "Good 
Luck," "James' Park," "Lamar's Outlet," "Knave's 
Disappointment, " " Conjurer 's Disappointment, ' ' 
"Argyle, Cowell and Lome," and others. "Mount 
Pleasant" and "Pleasant Plains" were re-surveys on 
older grants. 

An early grant for a tract called "Rome" is worthy 
of especial mention. 

The poet Moore, who visited Washington during the 
administration of Mr. Jefferson, satirized in verse 
what he assumed to be the disposition of the Washing- 
tonians to borrow the nomenclature of ancient Rome. 
He wrote: 

" In fancy now beneath the twilight gloom, 
Come, let me lead thee o'er this modem Rome, 
Where tribunes rule, where dusky Davi bow, 
And what was Goose-Creek once, is Tiber now. 
This fam'd metropolis, where fancy sees 
Squares in morasses, obelisks in trees; 
Which travelling fools, and gazetteers adorn 
With shrines unbuilt, and heroes yet unborn; 

Tho' naught but wood and they see, 

Where streets should run, and sages ought to be." 

That the Washington "Tiber" had borne the name 
long before the City of Washington was even dreamed 
of is shown by the fact that a patent was issued by 



2 2 Old Georgetoum: 

the Colonial authorities of Maryland on May 13, 1664, 
to a facetious gentleman by the name of Francis Pope, 
for a tract of land called ' ' Rome, ' ' situated on ' ' Tiber ' ' 
Creek and containing 400 acres. This tract fell within 
the lines of the City of Washington, and the capitol 
building is situated upon or near it. Mr. Pope had, 
evidently, a desire to be known as "Pope, of Rome, 
on Tiber." In cheerful contrast with the humiliating 
picture drawn by Moore of local conditions as he saw 
them is the picture drawn by another observer as to 
the conditions of the future and which have been 
happily realized. 

In the Surveyor's office there is an old book, one of 
the records of the first commissioners of the City of 
Washington, upon a blank page of which there is 
written, under date of Januaiy 5, 1795, and under the 
heading "Prophecy" the following: 

"The time will come when this wide waste of morass and 
thicket, open plain and wooded dell will resound with the 
busy hum of industry and be redolent with the glow of action 
and the thrill of life! — the swamps along the Tiber, teeming 
as they do now with all the varieties of animal and vegetable 
life, before the destructive march of man will gradually dis- 
appear, and Art will erect its palaces over the ruins of 
nature. ' ' 

Plantation Life. 

Some glimpses of plantation life in the Province 
are afforded by early writers. 

Whitfield said in 1740 that he "found a sad dearth 
of piety in Maryland." Virginia was in no better 
condition. After the establishment of the Church of 
England it was necessary to obtain clergymen. Another 
early writer states that "but few of good conversa- 
tion would adventure . . . yet many came, such as 



Old Georgetown. 23 

wore black coats, and could babble in a pulpit, roare 
in a tavern, exact from the parishioners, and rather 
by their dissoluteness destroy than feed their flocks." 
In the language of another, "a good school for use- 
ful learning is scarcely to be found on this continent. 
They have a college at Williamsburg, that spoils 
many a man. Most of their youth are turned out with 
a smattering of pretty stuff ; and without a solid foun- 
dation set themselves up as the standards of wit, and 
what is most impudent, of superior judgment. ' ' 

Scharf says that the cause of education made slen- 
der progress, and that the earlier generations of 
Marylanders thought more of horse-racing, cock-fight- 
ing, hunting, cards and dancing than they did of 
books; added to wliich there was an undeniable fond- 
ness of the people for rum and sugar, the ordinary 
tipple ; all the rough English sports were in vogue ; 
every planter's porch was crowded with yelping fox- 
hounds ; there was also another kind of dog described 
as "a strong and courageous animal of great mod- 
esty, ' ' a cross between the Newfoundland and the Irish 
wolf hound, "which would swim a mile out in the water 
in the teeth of a November gale and bring to shore a 
wounded swan, or perish in the attempt." These were 
the days, he says, of "royal suppers of duck and hom- 
iny, two or three ducks to a man, and rum punch, and 
goblets of fine old Madeira, drawn from the wood, the 
long clay pipes smoked by the blazing log fires, card 
parties of whist and all fours and bluff and brag, and 
to bed long after midnight. ' ' 

In the beginning the wearing apparel of the man 
was made of course material, and largely of the skins 
of bears and other wild animals, but in the course 
of time these gave way to more pretentious articles 
patterned after the fashionable attire of England. 



24 Old Georgetown. 

**Tlie hat was of felt or wool, with a low crown 
and broad brim, sometimes, but not always, turned up 
and cocked. About his neck he wore a white linen 
stock, fastening with a buckle at the back. His coat 
was of cloth, broad-backed with flap pockets, and his 
waistcoat of the same stuff came down to his knees. 
He wore short breeches with brass or silver knee 
buckles, red or blue garters, and rather coarse leather 
shoes strapped over the quarter." 

The houses were of log, chinked with clay; flooring, 
except that furnished by nature, was unknown; three 
legged stools and wooden blocks did duty as chairs, the 
tables were roughly constructed and the table serv- 
ice consisted of wooden bowls, trenchers, platters and 
noggins, with gourds and squashes and sometimes a 
few pewter dishes, plates and spoons. 

The skins of bears and other wild animals were an 
acceptable substitute for bed clothes and to a great 
extent for cloth for wearing apparel and were hung 
on wooden pegs around the cabins. 

In the course of time, and as Tobacco became King, 
the primitive furniture gave way to more pretentious 
articles. 

Frederick County, at the time Georgetown was 
created, comprised the territory from Kock Creek 
along the Potomac to the western boundary of the 
Province. It was, for the most part, virgin wilder- 
ness and seems to have been suffering from a sin- 
gular combination! of evils: wolves and wild horses. 
In the year 1750, an act was passed by the Legislature 
for destroying wolves in the county in which it is 
recited that they are so numerous and mischievous 
that "if not timely prevented, they will not only in- 
fest that county, but the whole Province," and about 
the same time an act was passed "to prevent the 



Old Georgetown. 25 

evils occasioned by the nmltitude of horses, and re- 
straining horse rangers, within the Province, and to 
redress the great evil accruing to this Province by the 
multiplicity of useless horses, mares and colts that 
run in the woods." 

Courts and Lawyers. 
Although the judicial machinery was set in mo- 
tion in the colony by acts passed by the Assembly 
of 1638-39 creatmg a Court of Admiralty, a County 
Court, a Court of Chancery, a Court Praetorial, and 
Justices of the Peace, yet there was long a dearth of 
legal business and the services of the lawyer were 
not in demand. A person writing from the colony 
about the year 1660 says : 

"Here, if the lawyer had nothing else to maintain him but 
his bawling, he might button up his chops and burn his buck- 
ram bag, or else hang it upon a pin until its antiquity had 
eaten it up with dirt and dust ; then, with a spade like his 
grandsire Adam, turn up the face of creation, purchasing 
his bread by the sweat of his brows, that before was got by 
the motionated waterworks of his jaws." 

In the course of time things seem to have changed 
for the better, so far as the profession was concerned 
at least, for in the year 1772 another person writing 
from the colony said: 

"A litigious spirit is very apparent in this country. The 
assizes are held twice in the year in the City of Annapolis, 
and the number of cases then brought forward is really 
incredible." 

That the lawyers, however, had become troublesome 
as early as 1715 is evident from an act passed by the 
Colonial Assembly in that year "for rectifying the ill 



26 Old Geor^etoxcm 



to' 



practices of attorneys in this Province." By this act 
their fees, payable in tobacco, were prescribed, and it 
was provided that if they should presume to ask, re- 
ceive, take or demand any greater or larger fee they 
should be incapable of practicing law in any court of 
the Province. This law being found to be inetfctual, 
another one was passed in 1725 for the same purpose. 
It recited complaints ''of the exorbitant fees taken by 
Counsellors at Law, Chamber Counsellors, Barristers, 
Attorneys and other Practitioners and Advisers in the 
law, to the great Damage and Grievance of the good 
people of this Province and impoverishing of them- 
selves and families. ' ' This act again established a scale 
of fees, and further provided forms of oaths to be taken 
by lawyer and client before the institution of the suit; 
the one, that he had not received any greater fee than 
that allowed by the act ; and the other, that he had not 
paid any such fee. 

Eben Cook, gent., visited the Maryland side of the 
Potomac, on a commercial venture, the results of which 
were most unsatisfactory to him. He printed in Eng- 
land, in 1708, in verse an account of his experience, in 
which he gives a description of the tobacco planters 
and depicts scenes and incidents attending a meeting 
of the County Court. Mr. Cook, no doubt, found that 
social conditions were in a crude state, but the feeling 
of resentment and prejudice which he manifests, is 
such as to justify the belief that what he says is a 
gross caricature of the real facts. From his story we 
extract the following: 

" I put myself and Goods a-shoar; 
Where soon repaired a numerous Crew, 
In Shirts and Drawers of Scotch Cloth Blue, 
With neither Stockinjxs. Hat, nor Shooe, 
These Sot Weed Planters crowd the Shoar, 



Old Georgetown. 27 

In Inie as tawny as a Moor; 
Figures so strange, no God designed 
To be a part of Human kind, 
But wanton Nature, void of Rest, 
Moulded the brittle Clay in Jest." 

He describes the meeting of the court as follows : 

" We sat, like others, on the Ground, 
Carousing Punch in open Air, 
Till Crier, did the Court declare. 
The planting Rabble being met, 
Their drunken Worships likewise sit; 
Crier proclaims that Noise should cease 
And streight the Lawyers broke the peace; 
Wrangling for Plaintiff and Defendant, 
I thought they ne'er would make an End on't; 
With Nonsense, Stuff and false Quotations, 
With brazen Lyes, and Allegations; 
And in the splitting of the Cause, 
They used such Motions with their Paws, 
As showed their Zeal was strongly bent 
In Blood to end the Argument. 
A reverend Judge who to the Shame 
Of all the Bench could write his Name, 
At Petty-fogger took Offense, 
And wondered at his Impudence. 
My Neighbor Dash with Scorn, replies, 
And in the Face of Justice flies. 
The Bench in Fury streight divide, 
And Scribble's take or Judge's side; 
The Jury, Lawyers, and their Clyents, 
Contending, fight like Earth-born Gyants." 

In 1717 there was a lawyer in the Province named 
Macnamara, who was the prosecutor of the suits of 
the Crown, and such an exceptionally troublesome 
fellow that a special Act of the Legislature was passed 
in that year to disbar him from practicing in all other 
suits than those of the Crown. According to the re- 
citals in the act, he had once been suspended for his 
misdeeds, but had been restored again upon the late 



28 Old Georgetotcn. 

Queen's order. Claiming that the order exempted 
him from the application of the powers of the courts, 
he treated them in an indecent manner when he pleaded 
before them, despising their authority and even threat- 
ening their persons. He is described in the act as '^a 
man of threatening, litigious and revengeful temper," 
who had at length arrived at "so intolerable a degree 
of pride and arrogance as even to threaten the Gov- 
ernor"; and it was declared that his insolence had re- 
sulted in a declaration by several of the judges that 
they would no longer continue in their stations if so 
turbulent a person was allowed to practice before 
them— 

"All of which actions and many others (some whereof he 
has been convict and others been acquitted from by his man- 
agement of juries and subtlety in the law) too tedious to enu- 
merate, are of so haughty and daring a nature that the honor 
of the Government cannot be supported nor the magistrates 
be safe and easy in the execution of justice, nor the peace of 
the Province preserved unless some remedy be provided, not 
only for the discouragement of him, the said Thomas Mac- 
namara, but all others of like demeanor." 

A different and more edifying stoiy, in regard to 
the Maryland lawyer of 1783, is told by an Englishman, 
who visited Annapolis in that year. He states : 

"Annapolis is a nursery of the long robe. Its lawyers 
would do honor to any bar in Europe. The Governor, who 
is of this profession, has instituted a society composed of 
students of the law, who meet at his house at stated periods 
to discuss law questions and questions in political economy. 
He proposes the subject, sits as President and gives judgment 
in conjunction with his Council, the Chancellor and the 
Judges of the General Court. "WTien the debates are finished 
the company sup with the Governor. For a country to be 



Old Georgetown. 29 

happy the people must be virtuous; to render them so, their 
leaders ought to set the example and the government to con- 
firm the practice by making it necessary." 



WhetherJ^eorgetown had arrived at that degree of 
eminence in 'good works prior to the year 1772 when 
the support of a lawyer could be credited to her can- 
not be determined; but that she was doing her duty 
in that respect in the year 1773 would seem to be 
reasonably well established, for among the subscribers 
to an edition of Blackstone printed in Philadelphia in 
that year we find the name of Joseph Earle, a George- 
town lawyer. The book was issued in four volumes, 
and the subscription price a considerable sum, so we 
may infer that the professional gentleman was fairly 
prosperous. 

The Coeporation Court or Mayor's Court.- 

The Mayor 's Court of Georgetown was the first court 
which existed in the present District of Columbia. By 
the Act of Incorporation of 1789, the Mayor, Recorder 
and Aldermen, or any three or more of them, were 
authorized to hold a court in the town, to be called the 
Mayor's Court, and to appoint proper officers therefor 
and settle reasonable fees. The Mayor's Court had the 
same jurisdiction as to debts that the justices of the 
peace of the counties of the State had by law. It also 
had concurrent jurisdiction with the County Court of 
Montgomery County in all criminal cases except such 
as affected life or member, if the crime or offence were 
committed in the town or any of its precincts by any 
inhabitant of it or by any person not a citizen of the 
State, and appeals lay from its judgments to the County 
Court. The Mayor 's Court continued in existence from 
the time of its establishment down to the time when the 
3 



30 Old Georgetown. 

town passed under the jurisdiction of the United States 
as a part of the Federal District. That its sessions 
were not held with a satisfactoiy degree of regularity 
may be inferred from the fact that in the year 1798 the 
corporation passed an ordinance establishing regular 
meetings for it. 

Prior to the year 1799 the power of granting licenses 
to ordinary keepers and retailers of spirituous liquors 
was vested in the County Courts of the different coun- 
ties of the State; the manner in which the County 
Court of Montgomery County made such appointments 
in Georgetown gave offence to the people of the town 
and in the j^ear 1798 the corporation resolved to pre- 
sent a remonstrance to that court, setting forth the 
injury and inconvenience arising to the citizens from 
the indiscriminate way in which tavern licenses had 
been granted. The complaints were felt at Annapolis, 
for in 1799, the power of granting such licenses was 
vested in the Mayor's Court. 

The Mayor's Court, after administering justice for 
twelve years was legislated out of existence by the act 
of Congress of February 27, 1801, which provided for 
the establishment of a tribunal with jurisdiction over 
the whole District, to be called the "Circuit Court of 
the District of Columbia." The act continued all cases 
pending before the Corporation Court of Georgetown 
to the new court. 

A Doctor's Bill in Colonial Days. 

In colonial days the country was sparsely settled, 
towns were few, and except the centers of trade on the 
navigable waters, of inconsiderable population. The 
practice of medicine was attended with many incon- 
veniences. From the necessities of his situation, the 
practitioner, especially in the remote districts, was 



Old Georgetown. 31 

forced to perform the double office of physician and 
apothecary. 

His visits to his patients involved long rides on 
horseback, over the worst of roads and in all sorts of 
weather. In his saddle-bags were carried the imple- 
ments and snch an assortment of drugs and medicines 
as were deemed sufficient for ordinary emergencies. 

The country doctor is still a useful and necessary 
factor in the life of many localities, and those of us who 
spent our youthful days, or a portion of them, ''in 
the woods ' ' can recall him and the feeling of awe with 
which he inspired us. 

The following bill rendered by one of them, a Mary- 
land practitioner, to his patient in 1767, is an interest- 
ing relic of the time: 

Mr. James Ogleby To Dr. R. Hnlse. 

1767. s. d. 

Aug. 15. Diuretic Mixture 5. 

Visit 12 miles 15. 

" 25. Finest Turkey Rhubarb 3. 6 

Vomit 1. 

5 Astringent Powders 5. 

Febrifuge Mixture 5. 6 

" 27. Stomach drops for the vomiting. . 2. 6 

6 Astringent Powders 6.0 

Restringent Mixture 5. 6 

Plaster for the vomiting 3. 6 

A visit 15. 

** 29. Opening Mixture 5. 6 

2 Anadyne Boluses 2. 

Astringent Mixture % pint 6. 

2 Vomits 2. 

£4. 2. 6 
Mr. Ogleby: 

Agreeable to your request above is your account & I am 



32 Old Georgetown. 

confident no Person in the Province administers medicine 
upon more easy terms than myself as you will find upon mine 
being compared with any others in the profession. 

Early Settlers and the Tobacco Trade. 

The disturbances in Scotland in 1715 and 1745 tended 
largely to accelerate the tide of emigration from that 
country to the shores of the Potomac. 

In the year 1751 numerous families, principally 
Scotch, were settled in this vicinity, and upon the peti- 
tion of some of the settlers, setting forth that there was 
a convenient place for a town in Frederick County, on 
the Patowmack River, above the mouth of Rock Creek, 
adjacent to the Inspection House," an act was passed 
appointing Captain Henry Wright Crabb, Master John 
Needham, Master John Clagett, Master James Perrie, 
Master Samuel Magruder, the Third, Master Josias 
Beall, and Master David Lynn as Commissioners and 
authorizing them to purchase and lay off into eighty 
lots, for a town to be called Georgetown, sixty acres, 
parts of the tracts of land belonging to George Gordon 
and George Beall. The act provided that if an agree- 
ment could not be had with Gordon and Beall as to the 
value of the land to be taken the same should be deter- 
mined by a jury of freeholders of the bailiwick. 

George Beall was the owner of a tract called the 
''Rock of Dumbarton," which had been patented in 
1703 to his father, Colonel Ninian Beall, and had de- 
scended to him under the primogeniture law as the 
eldest son and heir at law of the latter. Colonel Ninian 
Beall was a man of note in the Province, for, in 1699, 
the Colonial Legislature of Maryland passed *'an Act 
of Gratitude" to him ''for his services upon all incur- 
sions and disturbances of the neighboring Indians" and 
appropriated seventy-five pounds sterling for the benefit 



Old Georgetown. 33 

of himself and family. After obtaining the patent for 
the ''Rock of Dumbarton" he ''pitched his tent," ac- 
cording to Balch, in the wilderness about where the 
building formerly known as the Seminary Building 
stands at the northeast corner of the streets formerly 
known as Gay and Washington streets and now known 
as N and Thirtieth streets, respectively. Balch states 
that he died at "Fife Largs," one of his estates on the 
Eastern Branch, at the advanced age of one hundred 
and seven years. It is probable that Ninian Beall and 
George Gordon were the first persons to make a settle- 
ment at or near the site of Georgetown. Col. George 
Beall, a grandson of Ninian, was buried in the Presby- 
terian Cemetery, in the square bounded by 33d (for- 
merly Market) Street, 34th (formerly Frederick) 
Street, Q (formerly 4th) Street and R (formerly 5th) 
Street. The inscription on his tombstone shows that 
he was born on the site of Georgetown, February 26, 
1729, which was 22 years before the town came into 
existence, and that he died in 1807 in his 79tli year. 

George Gordon became the owner, in 1734, of a part 
of "Knave's Disappointment," a tract containing three 
hundred acres, which had been originally patented to 
James Smith and which part was thereafter known as 
George Gordon's "Rock Creek Plantation." He held, 
at one time, the office of sheriff of Frederick County, 
and, under the direction of the County Court, set up 
at Rock Creek that ancient instrument of punishment 
known as the Stocks. Gordon was one of the Judges 
of the first County Court of Frederick County. 

The "Inspection House" referred to in the act was 
on the land of Gordon. 

In the days of the first settlements on this part of the 
river, tobacco was the most profitable, and hence be- 
came the principal article of produce of the colonists ; 



34 Old Georgetown. 

owing to the scarcity of money, tobacco usiiii3ed its 
functions as the standard of value and became the great 
medium of exchange. The public dues and the pen- 
alties imposed by the colonial laws were payable in 
''pounds of tobacco," and even recoveries in the courts 
against recalcitrant debtors were in the same commodity 
instead of money. An early English writer calls it the 
''meat, drink, clothing and money of the colonists." 
Our District records show that as late as the year 1801 
a defendant convicted in the courts of larceny was sen- 
tenced to be "pilloried for one-quarter of an hour and 
to have ten stripes and to pay 360 pounds of tobacco, ' ' 
and that two other persons convicted of the same 
offense— the stealing of a hog in this instance— were 
sentenced to "pay four-fold, to wit: 600 pounds of 
tobacco, ' ' to the owner, Robert Peter. 

On account of its importance the regulations in re- 
gard to its export were very strict and required that 
previous thereto it should be brought to certain ware- 
houses to be inspected. These warehouses were called 
"Inspection Houses." 

Either on account of the convenience of that method 
of moving it, or the scarcity of wheeled vehicles, the 
planters adopted the method of "rolling" the tobacco 
(that is, putting it in large hogsheads, averaging 1,000 
pounds, rigged with an axle and tongue and drawn by 
horses or men) over the roads to the nearest warehouse. 
This gave rise to the terms "Rolling Roads" and 
"Rolling Houses," sometimes applied to such roads 
and warehouses. In 1763 there was in Frederick 
County but one place for the inspeection of tobacco, and 
that "at the Rolling House which George Gordon built 
near the mouth of Rock Creek." Exactly when this 
house was built does not appear, but it was certainly 
between the years 1734 and 1748 ; it was doubtless con- 



Old Georgetown. 35 

structed of logs, the most available building material 
of those primitive days, and was succeeded later by two 
large buildings of brick. Its site on the original map 
of Georgetown is marked ''The Warehouse Lot" and 
is now occupied by buildings of the Washington and 
Georgetown Railroad Company, on the south side of 
M Street a little to the west of Wisconsin Avenue. 

The inspection houses naturally became centers of 
trade, and the ''Inspection House" or "Rolling House" 
which George Gordon built was the germ of the future 
city. 

The tobacco business of Georgetown grew rapidly 
and ultimately assumed such proportions that three 
large warehouses were required to accommodate it; we 
have the authority of General Washington for the state- 
ment that in the year 1791 it ranked as the greatest 
tobacco market in the State, if not in the Union. 

There is to the historian a discouraging lack of spe- 
cific details as to the Potomac trade in colonial days, 
but the following copy of a bill of lading issued in the 
year 1773 preserves the name of one vessel that was 
then engaged in it and that of her commander, and the 
quaint character of its phraseology gives it an interest 
as a type of the kind then in vogue. 

' ' Shipped by the Grace of God, in good order and well con- 
ditioned by William Lee in and upon the good ship called the 
Friendship, whereof is Master^SS^od for the present Voy- 
age, William Roman, and now riding at Anchor in the River 
Thames and by God's Grace bound for Virginia, to say one 
case. One Trunk, one Box of Merchandise, being marked and 
numbered as in the margin and are to be delivered in like 
good order and well conditioned at the aforesaid Port of Vir- 
ginia (the danger of the sea only excepted) unto Mrs. Anna 
Washington at Pope 's Creek, Potomak River or to her assigns. 
Freight for the said goods being paid with Primage and Aver- 
age accustomed. 



36 Old Georgetown. 

' ' In witness whereof the Master or Purser of the said Ship 
hath affirmed to three Bills of Lading, all of this Tenor and 
Date, the one of which three Bills being accomplished the 
other two to stand void. And so God send the good Ship to 
her desired Port of Safety — Amen. 

"Dated at London 24 Dee. 1773. 

"Wm. Roman." 

There was another form of bill of lading in use from 
wliich the name of the Deity was omitted. A George- 
town business man who had both on hand rather irrev- 
erently advertised the fact that he had for sale bills of 
lading "with or without the grace of God." 

Saw Pit Landing at the Mouth of Rock Creek. 

As early as 1703 there was a landing on the George- 
town side of Eock Creek where it entered the Potomac, 
called "Saw Pit Landing"; this landing shows that the 
place had then some importance as a trading post, and 
the utility of Rock Creek for the purposes of commerce 
is shown by the fact that as late as the year 1792 the 
Maryland Legislature passed an act to preserve its 
navigation. 

By this act the making of weirs and hedges in and 
upon the creek within the distance of two miles from 
the Potomac was prohibited under a penalty, and those 
already made were declared nuisances which any person 
was at liberty to pull down and destroy. Saw Pit 
Landing formed the southeastern corner of George- 
town, and, although the point is now far inland, in the 
year 1751, and for many years thereafter, the tide 
ebbed and flowed to it. 

The mouth of the Rock Creek of our day does not 
exhibit a single feature of its appearance in the year 
1751, when Georgetown was created; at that time the 



Old Georgetown. 37 

creek was a navigable stream within which the tide 
ebbed and flowed for a considerable distance above the 
present P Street bridge ; then, and for many years sub- 
sequently, there was visible in it, on frequent occasions, 
the tall masts of the trader to European or coastwise 
ports, where now the only water craft to be seen is the 
sand scow. 

The creek at its junction with the river formed quite 
a large bay ; its mouth extended from the point near the 
old Observatory grounds, where Littlefield's Wharf is 
located (which point was first known as Cedar Point, 
and afterwards, successively, as Windmill Point, Peter's 
Point and Easby's Point), to a point on the present 
Water Street, east of and near its intersection with 
Wisconsin Avenue, which was formerly known as High 
Street, and later as Thirty-second Street. 

All of the ground south of the present Water Street 
and much of the ground north of it, from the latter 
point eastward has been reclaimed from the creek and 
river. There has also been a considerable reclamation 
of land on the Washington side of the creek, but not 
so great as on the Georgtown side. With reference 
to the present situation, the westerly or Georgetown 
line of the creek, as it formerly existed and as it was 
located on a plat based on early records and prepared 
for me some years ago by Mr. William Forsyth, the 
Surveyor of the District, may be roughly described as 
beginning at a point on the river slightly to the east 
of the place where the east line of High Street (now 
Wisconsin Avenue) intersects it, and thence running 
in a northeasterly direction, crossing the south line 
of Water Street, about midway between High and 
Congress (now Thirty-first) streets, thence across 
Water Street and through the southeastern part of the 
square between High and Congress streets, cutting off 



38 Old Georgetown. 

a small corner of it, and striking the west line of Con- 
gress Street a short distance above Water Street; 
thence crossing Congress Street and entering the square 
between Congress and Jefferson streets, and passing 
through it and striking the west line of Jefferson Street 
at a point still farther north of Water Street; thence 
crossing Jefferson Street and entering the square be- 
tween Jefferson and Washington (now Thirtieth) 
streets, and striking the west line of Washington Street 
at a point still farther north of Water Street, and en- 
tering the square between Washington and Greene 
(now Twenty-ninth) streets, striking a point on the 
west line of Greene Street still farther north of Water 
Street and nearer to the line of the Chesapeake and 
Ohio Canal than to Water Street; thence across Greene 
Street and through the square between Greene Street 
and the canal basin, and to a point near where Mont- 
gomery (now Twenty-eighth) Street terminates at the 
basin; and thence, still in a northeasterly direction, 
considerably to the west of the basin, and to the creek 
at a point above that at which Bridge (now M) Street 
meets it. Neither Washington Street nor any of the 
streets between it and Eock Creek were in the original 
town. 

It will thus be seen that a large portion of the squares 
fronting on the north side of Water Street between 
Greene and Congress streets, and the southeastern cor- 
ner of the square between Congress and High streets, 
were then under water, as was also that portion of 
Water Street itself eastward of the line which I have 
indicated, together with the sites of all the warehouses, 
wharves, lumber yards, etc., extending from a point of 
beginning near Wisconsin Avenue, along the river 
front to the lock at the present mouth of the creek 
or basin. 



Old Georgetown. 39 

The high bluff which extended along the line, as well 
as along the river shore, above it, is still indicated by 
the steep grades of the streets extending from M to 
Water Street. 

The Okiginal Survey and Plan of the Town. 

The survey of the sixty acres into eighty lots was 
made by Alexander Beall, whom the commissioners had 
elected as clerk and appointed as surveyor, and appli- 
cation was made to Gordon and Beall for the purchase 
of the land. As they refused to sell upon what were 
considered by the commissioners reasonable terms, a 
warrant was issued to Josias Beall, the coroner, to 
summon a jury of seventeen to meet at the Inspection 
House above the mouth of Rock Creek on the twenty- 
eighth day of September, 1751, to assess the value of 
the same. The jury made a return awarding to Gordon 
and Beall £280 currency as the value of their land. 
There was included in the town 26 11/16 acres of 
Gordon's land and 33 5/16 acres of Beall 's land. 

The eastern boundary line of the town originally was 
a line running parallel with the present Thirtieth 
Street (formerly Washington Street), and distant wes- 
terly from it 120 feet ; the northern boundary was a line 
parallel with the present M Street (formerly Bridge 
Street), 120 feet south of the present south line of N 
Street (formerly, in part First and in part Gay Street). 

Beall's Additions, Beatty and Hawkins' Addition, 
Peter, Beatty, Threlkeld and Deakins' Addition, Threl- 
keld's Addition, and Deakins, Lee and Casenave's Ad- 
dition, Holmead's Addition and the Western Addition 
were added at various times subsequently. 

On the original plat of the town, prepared by Beall, 
the street along the river has three names. The part 
of it between the present Thirty-first Street and the 



40 Old Gcorgetoivn. 

present Wisconsin Avenue is designated "Wapping.'^ 
From the river "Wapping" ran in a northeasterly- 
direction, a course different from the present "Water 
Street, which is east and west. The part between the 
present Wisconsin Avenue and the present Thirty- 
third Street is designated as "The Keys," and the part 
extending from this point to the western boundary of 
the town is designated as ''West Landing." AVhen 
the construction of a bridge over the creek at' K Street 
was proposed, a fill for a street to connect with it was 
made through the water and which extended to Peter 
Casenave's stone warehouse which faced the river at 
or near the southeast corner of the present Wisconsin 
Avenue ; the name of the street along the river was then 
changed to Causeway Street, and still later to Water 
Street, its present name. 

There was but one east and west street shown on the 
plan, north of the one along the river front, and this 
had two names. The part of it east of Wisconsin 
Avenue is designated as ''Bridge Street" and the part 
of it west of Wisconsin Avenue is designated as "Falls 
Street." Later the name of Bridge Street was given 
to the street designated in part as "Bridge Street" and 
in part as "Falls Street." AAHien Georgetown became 
a part of the city of Washington the name of Bridge 
Street was changed to that of M Street. There are 
three north and south streets shown on the plan, the 
ones now known respectively as Thirty-first Street, 
Wisconsin Avenue and Thirty-third Street. That part 
of Thirty-first Street which lies north of M Street is 
designated as "East Lane," and the part which lies 
south of it is designated as "Fishing Lane." The 
name of Congress Street was subsequently given to 
"East Lane" and "Fishing Lane," and when George- 
town became a part of the city of Washington the name 



Old Georgetown. 41 

of Congress Street was changed to Thirty-first Street. 
The part of Wisconsin Avenue which lies north of M 
Street is designated on the plan as '■ ' High Street, ' ' and 
the part which lies south of it, as ''Water Street." 
Later the name of High Street was given to the whole 
street, and it was so known until the town became part 
of the city of Washington, when the name was changed 
to Thirty-second Street; later still this name was 
changed to Wisconsin Avenue. 

The part of Thirty-third Street which lies north of 
M Street is designated on the plan as "West Lane," 
and the part lying south of it as "Duck Lane." 

By an ordinance of the Corporation of Georgetown, 
passed April 13, 1818, the name of the street known as 
West Lane and Duck Lane was changed to Market 
Street. By the same ordinance many of the changes, 
above mentioned, in the names of the original streets 
were effected. Market Street became Thirty-third 
Street when Georgetown was made a part of Wash- 
ington. 

The squares or blocks between the streets having been 
laid off into lots, Beall and Gordon, the original pro- 
prietors of the land, were notified to appear and make 
choice of two lots, a privilege which was allowed them 
by the act providing for the establishment of the town. 
Gordon appeared and made selection, but Beall did not, 
whereupon he was notified that, unless he did so within 
the ten days, limited by the act, the lots would be dis- 
posed of and that he would have only himself to blame 
for the consequences. To this notice Mr. Beall, who 
seems to have been thoroughly dissatisfied with the 
proceedings of the commissioners, made the following 
response under date of March 7, 1752, which is pre- 
served upon the town records : 



42 Old Georgetown. 

"If I must part with my property by force. I had better 
save a little, than be totally demolished. Rather than have 
none I accept of the lots, said to be Mr. Henderson's and Mr. 
Edmonston's, but I do hereby protest and declare that my 
acceptance of the said lots which is by force, shall not debar 
me from future redress from the Commissioners or others. If 
I can have the right of a British subject I ask no more. God 
save King George." 

On March 8, 1752, a sale of lots was had which 
realized £191 and this was paid to Gordon and Beall. 
Wlien Mr. Beall received the money, the commissioners, 
who had been much exercised over his threatening atti- 
tude gave vent to their feelings of relief by a somewhat 
argumentative entry in the Kegister of their proceed- 
ings to the effect that by such receipt ''the said 
George Gordon and George Beall have verbally Re- 
mised and Released the said Commissioners from all 
sums of Money, Claim, Damage, Recompense and De- 
mands whatsoever, they ever had, now, or may here- 
after have for any Sum or Sums of Money due to him 
or them for any Lot or Lots so sold or any matter, 
cause or thing relative thereto. ' ' 

Erection of the Town Wharf. 

The sale of the lots in the town under the Act of 
1751 was coupled with certain requirements as to the 
erection upon them of buildings of specified dimensions 
by the purchasers within a limited time, and that con- 
siderable progress had been made in growth by the 
town in the first eleven years of its existence is evi- 
denced by the letting of a contract to Simon Nichols by 
the commissioners on October 5, 1762, for the erection 
of a wharf at the foot of Water Street, as that portion 
of Wisconsin Avenue between M Street and the present 



Old Georgetown. 43 

Water Street was then called. As this is the first wharf 
in the District of Columbia of which we have any de- 
tailed record, the specifications, as a matter of anti- 
quarian interest, are given in full : 

"The said wharf is to be built at the end of "Water Street 
and carried from thence 60 feet wide into the river so as to 
have 10 foot of water at the front in a low tide ; the outsides 
are to be of hewed logges, 12 inches thick Laped and the 
Joints broke, braced and girded with hewed logges 10 inches 
thick and 15 foot long and dovetailed into the outsides. The 
front to be dovetailed at the outsides and the end of every 
dovetail to be sawed off. The distance from the front to the 
first brace not to exceed 10 feet and the distance between 
every brace the same for the whole length of the wharf, the 
same to be filled up with stone within two feet of the wharf 
one foot of which is to be filled with clay or dirt, the other 
foot with gravel and to be raised three feet higher than a full 
tide. Every part of the work to be done in the strongest man- 
ner, and to the satisfaction of the workmen indifferently 
chosen, if any dispute should happen when the work is 
finished. 

* ' The said work is to be completely finished by the first day 
of September which shall be in the year 1763. One fourth 
of the money agreed for (being L 200 to be paid in dollars 
at 7/6 pistolls at 27s. or Pennsylvania Currency) to be paid 
in hand, one fourth to be paid when all the timber for the 
wooden part of the wharf is brought in place, the other half 
at the finishing of the whole work. Security to be given by 
the undertaker to the Commissioners before the payment of 
the first fourth. 

"N. B. There is to be a good and sufficient crane erected 
at the front of the wharf." 

Upon the completion of the wharf Mr. John Clagett 
was the only commissioner who thought it had not 
been done according to contract, thereupon choice was 



44 Old Georgetoism. 

made of Messrs. John Orme and Archibald Allen "es- 
teemed good workmen to view the same whose opinion 
was to be agreed to " ; they decided that the work had 
been sufficiently done according to contract. 

Fairs in the Town. 

By the Act of 1751 for the laying out of the town, it 
was provided that it should be lawful for the commis- 
sioners of the town to appoint two fairs to be held 
therein annually : the one to begin on the second Thurs- 
day in April, and the other on the first Thursday in 
October, which fairs should be held for the space of 
three days, and that during the continuance of such fair 
or fairs all persons within the bounds of the town 
should be privileged and free from arrest, except for 
felony or breach of the peace, and all persons coming 
to such fair or fairs or returning therefrom, should 
have the like privilege one day before and one day on 
their return therefrom ; and the commissioners were 
empowered to make such rules for the holding of the 
fairs as might tend to jDrevent disorder and incon- 
venience, and to the improvement and regulation of the 
town in general. 

As we have seen, there was a large preponderance of 
Scotia's sons among the inhabitants of the town, and 
it is quite likely that these Scotch forefathers of the 
hamlet in holding the fairs at Georgetown provided for 
by the act did so according to the customs in similar 
cases in the old country. We may well imagine the 
town bailiff, when the multitude had assembled, fol- 
lowing the style in the old country and opening the fair 
by a proclamation like the following : 

"0 yes! and that's e'e time; yes! and that's twa times. 
•O yes ! and that 's theird and last time ; all manner of Pearson 



Old Georgetown. 45 

and Pearsons whatsoe'r, let'um draw near, and I shall let 
them kenn, that there is a fair to be held at the muckle town 
of George for the space of three days; wherein if any Hus- 
trin, Custrin, Land Louper, Dub Skouper, or Gang the Gate 
Swinger, shall breed any Urdam, Durdam, Rabblement, Brab- 
blement, or Squabblement, he shall have his lugs tacked to the 
muckle Trone, with a nail of twal a Penny, until he is down 
of his Hobshanks, and up with his muckle Doaps, and prays 
to Hea'n neen times. God bless the King and thrice the 
muckle town of George, paying a Groat to me, Jemmy Fer- 
guson, Baily of the aforesaid town. So you have heard my 
proclamation and I'll haam to my Banner." 

The race-track was an established institution in the 
town in 1769. On April 10 of that year a notice was 
published that on May 30 there would be a race for a 
subscription purse of £25, free to any horse, mare or 
gelding, the best two of three heats of two miles each. 
If rising four years every animal was to carry 8 
stone and 4 pounds, bridle and saddle included; if 
five years, 9 stone ; if six years, 9 stone and 8 pounds ; 
and if seven years, 10 stone. An entrance fee of 25s. 
and satisfactory vouchers as to age to be required. 
And on the following day, a race for the balance of 
the subscription money and entrance fees, free to any 
horse, mare or gelding, those running in the race of 
the previous day only excepted. In the second day's 
race every horse 14 hands high was to carry 8 stone 
and 4 pounds, bridle and saddle included, and others 
to rise or fall according to the rules of racing. The 
horses were to be entered on the day preceding each 
race with Messrs. Joseph Bell, John Orme or Cornelius 
Davise. 

The fair and horse-race were doubtless contempo- 
raneous events in that day, as they are in this, in the 
agricultural districts. 



46 Old Georgetown. 

The first agricultural fair, so called, held in the 
United States, took place at Georgetown in the year 
1810. 

Braddock's Expedition. 

Alexander Beall, the clerk and surveyor of the town, 
resigned in 1757. Two years previously he had ac- 
cepted a captain's commission in the Maryland Pro- 
vincials, which had been raised for service against 
the Indians and the French. Beall had paid but little 
attention to his duties as clerk, and had made so many 
errors in his survey of the town that the Commis- 
sioners in 1758 entered into a contract with John Fred- 
erick Augustus Prigg, surveyor of Prince George's 
County, to correct the same. The Commissioners also 
agreed with Archibald Orme, for himself and two men, 
''to carry the chain and pole and whatever else the 
surveyor thinks necessary," for which he was to be 
paid eleven shillings per day and ''to find himself and 
men in diet and lodging, and to attend the surveyor 
between sunrise and sunset of 'each day." 

]\rilitary life was more congenial to Beall than fol- 
lowing the dull paths of peace in the quiet town, and 
on October 23, 1755, he left Georgetown for the fron- 
tier in command of a company of which Samuel Wade 
Magruder was lieutenant. 

In the month of April, 1755, the town was treated to 
its first sight of a British red-coat. During the pre- 
vious month seventeen transports and two ordnance 
ships, under the convoy of two men-of-war— the Sea 
Horse and Nightingale— arrived at Alexandria, hav- 
ing on board two regiments of infantry— the 44th, 
under the command of Colonel Sir Peter Halkctt, and 
the 48th, under Colonel Thomas Dunbar, each 500 
strong. These were to be recruited to 700 after their 



Old Georgetown. 47 

arrival in Virginia, and with two other regiments of 
a thousand men each, to be raised in America, were 
to constitute a force under the command of General 
Sir Edward Braddock, which was to dislodge the 
French and drive them from the country west of the 
Alleghanies. One of these regiments— that of Sir 
Peter Halkett— marched from Alexandria for Fort 
Cumberland, the site of the present city of that name, 
through a gap in the Blue Ridge and by way of Win- 
chester, in the Valley of Virginia, to its destination. 
The other— that under command of Colonel Dunbar— 
marched from Alexandria to a point opposite George- 
town, from which the men were ferried across the 
river and took the road from Georgetown to Frederick- 
town, Maryland. The baggage of this portion of the 
force was brought up the river by boats. From Fort 
Cumberland the expedition was to march to the junc- 
tion of the Ohio and Monongahela rivers, where the 
City of Pittsburg now stands and where the French 
had erected Fort Duquesne, named for the French 
Governor General of Canada. 

On the berme bank of the canal, just south of the Ob- 
servatory Grounds, there is a rock called " Braddock 's 
Rock" from a tradition that the force of the general 
landed at this place. Although this tradition is not 
well founded, as is shown by the orderly books of 
General Braddock, which were published in Lowder- 
milk's History of Cumberland, and which give the 
line of march of both regiments in their different 
routes to the common point at Fort Cumberland, yet 
this rock is historic. Before the day of the Chesa- 
peake and Ohio Canal it was a large and bold pro- 
jection into the river, and about it the river was par- 
ticularly deep. From the fact that it afforded an 
excellent landing place it became known in early days 



48 Old Georgetown. 

as "The Key of all Keys," a corruption of "The 
Quay of all Quays." When the Chesapeake and Ohio 
Canal was constructed through this part of Washing- 
ton, the tow path bank was filled in through the water 
of the river, and, in order to make it, it became neces- 
sary to blast and remove a large portion of this rock. 
During the administration of the early commission- 
ers of the City of Washington large quantities of stone 
were quarried from this place and used in the con- 
struction of the public buildings. 

That General Braddock's force did not land at this 
place is also evident from the fact that the mouth of 
Rock Creek in those days was a very considerabe body 
of water, and the point to which they wished to get, 
being the road from Georgetown leading to Frederick- 
town, Maryland, a landing on the east side of Rock 
Creek would have involved the unnecessary trouble 
of the crossing of another body of water— that is, the 
creek itself. 

Robert Peter and Thomas RiCHARDsoisr, Merchants. 

Troubles over the Ferry, the Stamp Act and 
THE Importation of Tea. 

Under the act for establishing the town, the Com- 
missioners were authorized to fill vacancies in their 
number occurring by death or otherwise. On Novem- 
ber 11, 1757, Robert Peter was chosen to fill a vacancy 
caused by the resignation of Josias Beall, who was 
selected as Clerk in the place of Alexander Beall, who 
had previously resigned from that position. 

Although not the very first man to engage in mer- 
chandising in Georgetown, Robert Peter was among 
the first to so engage, and may well be considered as 
entitled to the historical distinction of having been 
Georgetown's pioneer business man, for the business 



Old Georgetown. 49 

places that existed at the time of his arrival were 
insignificant. 

He was born in Scotland in 1726 and came to George- 
town shortly after his arrival at manhood. He em- 
barked in business in Georgetown about the year 1752. 
"Robert Peter's Rock Creek store" soon became the 
principal establishment in that section and was well 
known to the leading English and Scotch merchants 
of the day. He was the agent of the famous firm of 
John Glassford & Co., of North Britain, which mo- 
nopolized in large part the Potomac River tobacco 
trade. 

This firm at the first sale of lots in the town pur- 
chased a lot fronting on the north side of the street 
along the margin of the river, called **The Keys" 
(known now as Water Street) and about 250 feet west 
of what is now called Wisconsin Avenue, and erected 
upon it a storehouse. Mr. Peter was a member of ' 
the Board of Commissioners to whom the management 
of the affairs of the town had been committed by the 
Act of Assembly of 1751, for thirty-two years, and was 
the first mayor of the city upon its incorporation in 
the year 1789. 

He had a very prosperous career and invested 
largely in lands in Frederick, Montgomery (which was 
created in 1776 out of a part of Frederick), Prince 
George's and other counties of Maryland. He lived 
to see the foundation of the City of Washington laid 
and was the owner of a large portion of the land which 
was included within the limits of the Federal City. 

Scharf, the Maryland historian, says that Robert 
Peter, like most of the tobacco merchants of George- 
town and Blandensburg, was a Tory during the Rev- 
olutionary War. The following extracts from a letter 
dated at Georgetown, October 16, 1776, written by 



50 Old Georgetown. 

Mr. Peter and Thomas Eichardson to Thomas John- 
son as the representative of Frederick County in the 
Eevolutionarv Convention at Annapolis, disproves this 
statement and illustrates Georgetown's first embar- 
rassment in the matter of communication with her 
neighbors in Virginia. 

"We presume to address you as a member of our Conveu- 
tion in a matter which we think of the first importance in 
these times when despatch at ferries is so very necessary." 

The letter then proceeds to state that in Virginia 
ferries were regulated by law, while in Maryland they 
were not, which was the occasion, as the writers ap- 
prehended, of the evils of which they complained; 
that Colonel George Mason's ferry was established 
under the Virginia law; that Georgetown also had a 
ferry, but that Colonel Mason's tenants threatened a 
suit for presuming to land in Virginia, '*so that we 
are to reap no advantage from our situation on the 
river, which is wholly claimed by the State of Vir- 
ginia"; the letter then further proceeds to state that 
the Georgetown ferryman had been arrested on the 
Virginia side of the river and taken to Fairfax County 
jail after having been inveigled into ferrying the 
sheriff over and landing to collect his fee ; all of which 
the writers thought was concocted "with a design to 
prevent Maryland from having any ferry over the 
river at all." They submit the matter of right in- 
volved, for future action, and add, ''yet when dis- 
patch at ferries is at this time so vastly necessary for 
the post and for troops that may have occasion to pass, 
as well as for private travellers, we hope for immediate 
relief as to our ferryman, so far as it may be thought 
proper by your Convention, for it is notorious that 
unless he is released our passage over the Potomac 



Old Georgetown. $1 

to the southward or northward will be very much ob- 
structed—the Virginia ferryman having no boats, or 
at least not a sufficient number for our purposes." 

Thomas Johnson, to whom the letter was addressed, 
was not a member of the Convention, as the writers 
supposed, but he was the representative of Frederick 
County in the ''Council of Safety" formed in the 
colony, by which the Convention was called. It was 
a body of almost equal importance and had charge of 
affairs while the Convention was not in session. Mr. 
Johnson transmitted the letter to the Convention and 
the writers, together with John House, the ferryman, 
were summoned to attend and appeared before the 
Convention and their depositions were taken by a com- 
mittee of that body. What further action, if any, was 
taken in regard to the matter does not appear, but the 
State of Maryland, after its formation, passed an act 
(in 1781) giving authority to the various county courts 
to issue licenses and prescribe rates of ferriage. 

An interesting incident in the life of Mr. Peter, in 
which his conduct was eminently patriotic, grew out 
of the importation of certain tea by him a short time 
prior to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War. 

The news of the blockade of the Port of Boston 
under the Port Bill and of the ''Tea Trouble" at that 
place, and of the proceedings had in the Massachu- 
setts Colony, created great excitement in Maryland, 
in which the right of England to impose taxes in Amer- 
ica for the purpose of raising revenue had been 
strongly denied and its exercise constantly opposed. 

At a meeting of the freemen of Frederick County, 
held at Charles Hungerford's tavern (Rockville) on 
June 11, 1774, it was resolved that the town of Boston 
was suffering in the common cause of America, and 
that the most effective means for securing American 



52 Old Georgetown. 

freedom and the repeal of the obnoxious Acts of 
Parliament relating to the colonies was to break off 
commmiication with Great Britain. A non-importa- 
tion agreement was generally signed, which was en- 
forced relentlessly. 

The brigantine ''Mary and Jane," Captain John 
Chapman, master, arrived in the Potomac in August, 
17.74, and, having made a landing in the Wicomoco, it 
was ascertained that she had on board several chests 
of tea, consigned to Robert Peter and others in the 
Province; information of this having been communi- 
cated to the Committee of Correspondence for Fred- 
erick County, that committee immediately met to de- 
liberate what measures should be adopted "on the 
alarming occasion," as it was called. 

Mr. Peter, who had been requested to attend, ac- 
knowledged that the tea was shipped in consequence 
of orders given by him the previous December; that 
he had relied on the custom which had constantly pre- 
vailed in the Province since the partial repeal of the 
Revenue Act to screen him from censure and to justify 
his procedure; at the same time he submitted to the 
sentiment of the committee and declared an entire 
willingness to abide by their determination. 

The committee unanimously resolved "that the im- 
portation of any commodity from Great Britain liable 
for the payment of a duty imposed by an Act of Parlia- 
ment, however sanctioned by the practice of a part 
or even the whole of the trading part of the com- 
munity, is in a high degree dangerous to our liberties, 
as it implies a full assent to the claim asserted by the 
British Parliament of a right to impose taxes for the 
purpose of raising a revenue in America." Therefore, 
in order to discourage the pernicious practice, they 
"judged it expedient that the tea in question should 



Old Georgetown. 55 

not be landed in America, but that it should be sent 
back in the same ship." 

Mr. Peter readily acquiesced in the judgment of the 
committee and promised to prevent a delivery if it 
had not already been made. He intimated a desire 
that in the latter event it should be stored by any 
gentlemen appointed by the committee ; who thereupon 
resolved that if the tea had been landed it should be 
delivered to Messrs. Thomas Johns, William Deakins 
and Bernard O'Neale. Mr. Peter assented and, ac- 
cording to the chronicle, ''pawned his honor for the- 
faithful performance of his engagement." He was- 
then dismissed with the thanks of the committee for 
his candid and disinterested behavior. 

Thomas Richardson, another Georgetown merchant,. 
had just received a quantity of tea from Philadelphia,, 
and, being sent for, stated that he was ready and will- 
ing to deliver it to any person whom the committee 
should appoint, to be safely stored until further de- 
liberation. The committee accepted his proposition, 
highly commended his conduct, and the tea was de- 
livered to the same persons appointed to receive that 
of Mr. Peter. 

The women of Frederick County were as determined 
as the men in regard to the non-use of tea. After the 
beginning of hostilities, one of them wrote : 

"We have resolved to drink no more tea for years to come 
— not until the war is ended ; but we will eat mush and milk, 
drink water and live frugally until our fathers, sons and 
husbands and brothers achieve a brave victory." 

The destruction of the tea in Boston Harbor in 1774,. 
by a party of men disguised as Indians is in every 
primer of American history; but the still bolder act 
of the Marylanders in the destruction of tea at An- 
napolis is comparatively unknown. 



54 Old Georgetown. 

In the month of October, 1774, the brig "Peggy 
Stewart," Captain Jackson, arrived at Annapolis, 
having on board 2,320 pounds of what the chronicles 
of the time describe as ''that detestable weed" tea, 
consigned to a company of merchants in that city. 
Upon learning of its arrival, the Committee of Anne 
Arundel County called a meeting of the inhabitants. 
The deputy collector and the captain of the ship being 
present, the question was moved and seconded whether 
the tea should be landed in America or not; it was 
unanimously determined in the negative and a com- 
mittee of twelve persons was appointed to prevent the 
landing of that part of the cargo. 

The meeting adjourned for a few days and in con- 
sequence of a more general distribution of notices, 
when it met again the number of those in attendance 
was greatly increased. The consignees were called 
before the committee and an offer to destroy the tea 
was made by them; the committee reported this to the 
meeting, with a statement of their opinion that if the 
tea was destroyed by the voluntary act of the owners 
and proper concessions made, nothing further should 
be required. This not being satisfactory to all pres- 
ent, Mr. Stewart, one of the firm, voluntarily offered to 
bum the vessel and the tea in her, and that all proper 
acknowledgments should be made and published in the 
Maryland Gazette. The acknowledgment was unique 
and of the most abject character. The consignees 
severally signed a paper acknowledging that they had 
committed "a most daring insult and act of the most 
pernicious tendency to the liberties of America," 
humbly asked for pardon for the offense and declared 
that in the future they would never "infringe any reso- 
lution of the people for the salvation of their rights, 
nor do any act injurious to the liberties of the people." 
The acknowledgment concluded as follows: 



Old Georgetown. 5 5 

"And to show our desire of living in amity with the friends 
of America, we do request this meeting, or as many as do 
choose to attend, to be present at any place where the people 
shall appoint, and we will there consign to the flames or other- 
wise destroy as the people may choose, the detestable article 
which has been the cause of this, our misconduct." 

After signing this agreement, the owners of the 
tea went on board the vessel, her sails being set and 
her colors flying, and set fire to the tea, which, with 
the vessel, was consumed in a few hours, in the pres- 
ence of a great concourse of spectators. 

''An enemy of the cause of America" stigmatized the 
above proceeding as a "riot," and intimated that Mr. 
Stewart, one of the firm, had excited animosities by his 
spirited protest against the adoption at the first public 
meeting held in Annapolis after the passage of the 
Boston Port Bill of a resolution, among others, of a 
retaliatory kind— ''that the gentlemen of the law in the 
Province should decline bringing action for debts due 
to persons in Great Britain"; that his enemies had 
stirred up the populace against him, and that the people 
were so inflamed that they threatened death to him and 
destruction to his store and dwelling house, and that 
Mr, Stewart's "voluntary act" in setting fire to the 
ship was all that saved him, if not from the death and 
destruction threatened, at least from tar and feathers; 
and he lamented that the civil power at the capital of 
Maryland and the residence of the Governor was 
"unable to cope with or curb the fury of an exasper- 
ated people." 

The passage by the British Parliament of the Stamp 
Act in March, 1765, excited great indignation in Mary- 
land. In August of that year Zachariah Hood, who 
had been appointed by the British Ministry as the 
Stamp Distributor for Maryland, was burned in effigy 



56 Old Georgeioxcn. 

by the people of Fredericktown. The County Court of 
Frederick County on the fifteenth of Xovember, 1765, 
declared its unanimous opinion to be ''that all proceed- 
ings shall be valid and effectual without the use of 
stamps." The clerk of the court, who feared to issue 
writs without the stamped paper, refused to comply 
with the order of the court; whereupon he was com- 
mitted by the court for contempt. 

The Sons of Liberty publicly paraded and held a 
mock funeral, in which was carried a cofiin with the 
inscription * ' The Stamp Act ; Expired of a mortal stab 
received from the Genius of Liberty in Frederick 
County Court 22 November, 1765 ; Age 22 days. ' ' 

Early Hopes of Commercial. Greatness. 

The situation at the town at the head of navigation, 
on one of the noblest rivers of the world, which pene- 
trated far into the interior of the continent, and the 
unsurpassed water power at hefr very doors, coupled 
with other natural advantages, justified the faith enter- 
tained at an earl 5^ period in her history by her people— 
and which has been cherished by the generations who 
have succeeded them— that she was destined to become 
the seat of an extensive commerce and of large manu- 
facturing enterprises. Imbued deeply with this idea, 
her efforts to remove impediments to trade and inter- 
course with the country surrounding her and to im- 
jDrove her business facilities, have been energetic and 
unremitting; so long as she possessed the power of 
individual municipal action she never hesitated to 
spend her funds liberally for the accomplishment of 
these objects. She extended her favor and jDractical 
aid to every project and to every enterprise which 
promised to promote the welfareof her citizens, whether 
it had for its object the purchase of a toll bridge, or 



Old Georgetown. 57 

toll road, the improvement of the navigation of the 
river, in which her outlays of money borrowed for the 
purpose and interest thereon amounted to upwards of 
$170,000, the opening of some new channel of commu- 
nication with the country around her, or the exemption 
from taxation of a manufacturing enterprise. That 
her ambitious dreams have not been realized and that 
she has lost the rank and commercial eminence she had 
once attained and held as a seaport town is to be attrib- 
uted to the perversity of that fate which disappoints 
the best grounded hopes and expectations of men, rather 
than to any lack of enterprise, or energy, on the part 
of her people. 

Prior to the year 1774 the possibility of improving 
the navigation of the Potomac to a point convenient to 
the western rivers had been suggested. 

General Washington, who had spent his youth and 
early manhood in the valley of the Potomac and who 
had acquired a thorough familiarity with it through 
hunting expeditions, surveys for Lord Fairfax, and in 
the military service of the colony of Virginia, which 
latter took him across the mountains to the Ohio on 
several occasions, become convinced at an early day of 
the feasibility of such improvement by the construction 
of canals around the various falls, and of its necessity 
from a military as well as a commercial point of view 
as a protection to British interests in the territory west 
of the mountains against the encroachments of the 
French, then in possession of Canada. He sought to 
enlist the Provinces of Maryland and Virginia in the 
scheme long prior to the Revolutionary War. 

In 1770 he wrote to the Governor of Maryland, 
saying : 

"There is the strongest speculative proof in the world to 
me of the immense advantages which Virginia and Marvland 



5 8 Old Georgetoiofi. 

might derive (and at a \erj small expense) by making the 
Potomac the channel of commerce between Great Britain and 
that immense territory^ ; a tract of country which is unfolding 
to our view, the advantages of which are too great and too 
obvious, I should think, to become the subjects of serious 
debate, but which through ill-timed parsimony and supineness 
may be wrested from us and conducted through other chan- 
nels." 

His efforts were unavailing. The jealousy of Cen- 
tral Virginia in favor of the James River route mili- 
tated against the Potomac scheme, while in Maryland 
the jealousies of Georgetown and Baltimore for the 
western trade had grown up and what was attempted 
to be accomplished by one in the way of legislative 
action was opposed and counteracted by the other. 

Although unsuccessful in securing concerted action 
between the two colonies, Washington procured the 
passage, in 1772, of an Act by the Virginia Assembly, 
for the formation of a company, with authority 'Ho 
cut, support and repair, such canals, locks and other 
works" as might be necessary for "the expansion of 
the navigation of the Potomac River from tide water 
to Fort Cumberland." In aid of the enterprise a 
lottery was authorized and Patrick Henry, Robert 
Carter Nicholas, Peyton RandoliDh, Richard Bland, 
Benjamin Harrison of Berkeley, William Nelson, 
William Byrd, John Page, Benjamin Waller, Charles 
Carter of Shirley, Archibald Cary, George Wythe and 
John Blair were named, by the Act, as managers of it. 

In the year 1772 John Ballendine, the owner of a 
tract called Amsterdam at the Little Falls, submitted 
to the English merchants a plan and proposals for the 
improvement of the navigation of the Potomac above 
tide-water by which he proposed to make the river navi- 
gable and not to ask any recompense from them until 



Old Georgetown. 59 

the Colonial Governors of Maryland and Virginia had 
certified that he had satisfactorily accomplished what 
he proposed doing in this way. He sought local aid, 
and a subscription paper was circulated in Georgetown 
and elsewhere in the Province which was signed by 
several persons, and which, with the signatures, is as 
follows : 

''We, the subscribers, have considered John Ballendine's 
plan and proposals for clearing Patowmac River and do ap- 
prove it ; to enable him to set about that useful and necessary 
undertaking do hereby agree and promise severally to con- 
tribute such assistance or pay such sums as we respectively 
subscribe to the trustees named in the said proposals, or to 
their order, at such times and places and in such proportions 
as shall be required for the purpose of clearing said river. 

"Witness our hands this 10th day of October 1774. 

*'N. B. As nothing effectual can be properly done for less 
than thirty thousand pounds, this subscription is not binding 
unless the value of thirty thousand pounds Pennsylvania cur- 
rency should be subscribed. 

"G. Washington, 500 pounds, Virginia Currency. 

"Ralph Wormley, 500 pounds Virginia Currency. 

"Th. Johnson, Jr., for self and Mr. L. Jacques, 400 pounds, 
Pa. Currency. 

"George Plaix 300 pounds, currency. 

"T. Ridout, 200 

"Daniel Dulaney's son, Walter £200, currency. 

"David Ross for the Fredericksburg Company, 500 pounds 
Pa. Currency. 

"David Ross for himself, 300 pounds Pa. Currency. 

"Daniel and Samuel Hughes, 500 pounds Pa. Currency. 

"Benjamin Dulaney, 500 pounds, Pa. Money. 

"Thomas Ringgold, 1,000 pounds. Pa. Currency. 

"W. Ellzey, 100 pounds. 

"Jonas Clapham, 100 pounds, Virginia Currency. 

"William Deakins, Jr., 100 pounds — dollars at 7s. 6d. 



^ Old Georgetown. 

"Joseph Chapline, 50 pounds, common current money. 

"Thomas Richardson, 50 pounds, Pa. Currency. 

"Thomas Johns, 50 pounds, common current money. 

"Adam Stephen, 200 pounds, Pa. Currency. 

"Robert and Thomas Rutherford, 100 pounds, Pa. Cur- 
rency. 

"Francis Deakins, 100 pounds, common Currency of 
Maryland. 

"Ch. Carroll of Carrollton, one thousand pounds — dollars 
at 7s. 6d." 

Nothing was accomf)lished under the Virginia Act 
of 1772 or under the proposals of Ballendine, and this 
was due, doubtless, to the disturbed condition of affairs 
caused by the Revolutionary War. 

After the Revolutionary War a more favorable tem- 
per was developed in Virginia, but the merchants of 
Baltimore were powerful in that day as in this, with 
the Legislature in opposition to any measure which it 
was supposed would attract trade to any other market 
or not tend, directly or indirectly, to advance its 
interests. 

After the proclamation of peace, Washington made a 
tour of the western parts of New England and New 
York and traversed the country at the head of the 
Eastern Branch of the Susquehanna and his mind re- 
verted to the scheme of former years. He became 
more convinced of the advantages of the Potomac 
route and he addressed himself with renewed vigor to 
the effort of making the Potomac the channel for the 
conveyance of the extensive and valuable trade of the 
^'rising empire," as he called the country west of the 
mountains. He wrote letters to the Goveraors of 
Maryland and Virginia and to members of Congress 
urging the importance of action. In a letter to Jeffer- 
son, after adverting to the measures that would be 



Old Georgetown. 6i 

unquestionably taken by New York and Pennsylvania 
to acquire and keep the trade of the western country, 
he says: 

"I am not for discouraging the people of any state from 
drawing the commerce of the "Western country to its seaports 
— the more communications we open to it the closer we bind 
that rising world (for indeed it may be so called) to our inter- 
ests and the greater strength we acquire by it. Those to 
whom nature affords the best communication will, if they are 
wise, enjoy the greatest part of the trade. All I would be 
understood to mean, therefore, is that the gifts of Providence 
may not be neglected." 

The recommendations of the successful general of 
the Revolution received more attention than had been 
bestowed upon those of the Fairfax County surveyor, 
and his efforts resulted in the incorporation of the 
Potomac Company by the two states in 1784, with 
authority to improve the navigation of the river, to 
charge tolls, etc. General Washington became presi- 
dent of the company, which was the pioneer work of 
magnitude in the United States in the line of internal 
improvement enterprises. 

The citizens of Georgetown, appreciating the impor- 
tance of the enterprise to them, subscribed liberally to 
the stock of the company. 

After years of toilsome work and the expenditure of 
three quarters of a million of dollars in digging canals 
around the Little Falls, the Great Falls and other places 
and removing obstructions, the company succeeded in 
establishing an uncertain sort of navigation for gon- 
dolas and keel boats, as they were called; the burthen 
of the boats averaging from ten to twenty tons. The 
gondola was a roughly-constructed open boat and when 
it arrived at its destination on tide-water, was sold after 
5 



62 Old Georgetown. 

tlie cargo had been removed. The keel boat was more 
costly and pretentious, being fitted up with cabins and 
conveniences and would return with a light freight. It 
seems difficult to realize in this day of splendid trans- 
portation facilities by steamboat and railroad that the 
return trip against the current was accomplished by 
' 'poling," assisted by iron rings placed in the rocks 
along the bank at regular distances, and by the device 
called **a Yankee windlass" at others. 

One of the men who thus navigated the river, the 
elder Dickey, at the Great Falls on the Virginia side 
of the river, was alive at an advanced age a few years 
ago. He told me that the "poling" of the boats up 
the Potomac "was the hardest work ever done by man." 

While it was used 1,211,903 barrels of flour and 42,456 
barrels of whiskey, among other articles, were brought 
to tide-water, realizing $238,117.66 in tolls. The value 
of this merchandise was $9,935,964.00, and 15,000 boats 
of 179,554 tons in the aggregate were employed in its 
transportation. 

During its existence the trade of Georgetown extended 
as far as Fort Osage on the Missouri to Lake Erie and to 
Mobile. The route to Fort Osage was first up the Potomac 
220 miles, then overland to Brownsville on the Monon- 
gahela, a branch of the Ohio, 25 miles, thence down the 
Ohio to its junction with the Mississippi, up the ]\Iissis- 
sippi to St. Louis and aftei-wards b}' the Missouri 
to the Fort, For Lake Erie the goods were sent over 
the same route to Cincinnati on the Ohio, thence up the 
Miami of the Ohio to its farthest point at Lorimer's 
Store, thence overland 35 miles to Fort WajTie on the 
Miami of the Lakes, and down this river to Lake Erie. 
For ]SIobile the goods were sent from Georgetown to 
Brownsville by the above route, then down the Monon- 
gahela and Ohio to the mouth of the Tennessee river, 



Old Georgetown. 63 

then up this river to the Mussel Shoals or to Colbert's 
Ferry, thence overland to the Tombigbee at the junc- 
tion of that river with a branch called the Yibby, 120 
miles, thence down the Tombigbee to Mobile. 

Such inland trade (not by water) as the town en- 
joyed in its early days with the country immediately 
surrounding her came over the following roads, viz., the 
Main Road, leading from the town to Bladensburg 
which crossed at the ford of Eock Creek; the road to 
Fredericktown ; the road to Watts Branch; the road 
from Rock Creek Ford to Rock Creek Church, and the 
road across the river in Fairfax County leading first 
to Magee's and later to Mason's Ferry. 

There was a road to the Washington side of Rock 
Creek opposite Bridge Street which was not much used 
prior to the construction of a bridge across the creek 
by the town in 1788— the water being too deep to ford. 
Robert Peter, Thomas Beall of George, and William 
Deakins, Jr., commissioners for the construction of this 
bridge, invited proposals for the work by the following 
advertisement : 

"To be let to the lowest bidder on Monday the 19th in- 
stant at Mr John Suter's in Georgetown, the building of a 
bridge over Rock Creek near said town. As this is a build- 
ing of some consequence it is expected that no person will 
apply but those who are well qualified to execute the work in 
the neatest manner and to give ample security for the per- 
formance. ' ' 

Georgetown intended evidently in this instance to 
build well, but after some years of useful service the 
bridge was the scene of a melancholy accident; it gave 
way one stormy night and precipitated into the creek 
—then a considerable body of water as we have seen— a 
stage coach which was crossing it and the driver and 



64 Old Georgetown. 

horses were drowned. After this occurrence and the 
repair of the bridge a lively fancy aided by a little 
superstition on the part of the denizens of the vicinity 
had no difficulty in outlining on stormy nights the 
ghostly figure of the driver, with his coach and horses 
crossing it as he had been wont to do in the days of 
the flesh. The, traditions of the town are particularly 
rich in stories of ghosts and hobgoblins. Among them 
may be rhentioned the ''Drummer Boy of the Little 
Falls" and the ''Headless Man of K Street Bridge." 
Although the fonner has never been actually seen since 
his death, it may be asserted upon the authority of 
several more or less veracious persons that the roll of 
his drum can be distinctly heard at the gruesome hour 
"when night and morning meet," when church yards 
are supposed to yawn and graves give up their dead. 
The tradition in regard to the. drummer is that during 
the early part of the Revolutionary War he was drowned 
in crossing the river while proceeding to a muster on 
the Virginia side. "What caused the appearance of the 
headless man of K Street bridge I have not heard, and 
whether his forbearance has been due to a moral per- 
ception of the impropriety of taking what did not belong 
to him, or of the inutility to a spook of such an appen- 
dage as the head, it seems that he has never made an 
effort to supply himself with that article at the expense 
of any of those who have had occasion to pass that 
locality. The only losses of heads which he has been 
Imown to have caused have been of a purely figurative 
character. 

Flour Inspectors and Their Oaths of Office. 

In 1771 an act was passed providing for an inspection 
of flour at the town. The preamble recites "that it is 
represented that discoveries had been made of certain 



Old Georgetown. 65 

deceits practiced by the manufacturers of flour to tlie 
great J)rejudice of the "buyers thereof and injurious to 
the community," and to prevent the same the commis- 
sioners were authorized to appoint ^'a person of good 
repute and acquainted in the goodness and quality of 
flower" to be inspector. 

Four brands were established, superfine, fine, mid- 
dling and ship stuff, and the fee allowed for inspection 
and branding was l|d. for each cask. 

At a meeting of the commissioners on February 21, 
1772, they elected Thomas Brannan to the office of 
Inspector under this act, and, according to their min- 
utes, he took ''the several oaths of Government" and 
repeated and signed the following test, viz.: 

' ' I, Thomas Brannan, do declare that I do believe that there 
is not any transubstantiation in the sacrament of the Lord's 
supper or in the elements of bread and wine at or after the 
consecration thereof by any person whatsoever." 

The ''oaths of Government" referred to were com- 
monly known as the oaths of "Allegiance, Abhorrency 
and Abjuration" ; without the taking of which and sub- 
scribing the above test no person was capable of hold- 
ing any "Office, Deputation or Trust" within the Prov- 
ince. Brannan was succeeded in office by George 
Walker some years afterwards on account of inability 
to perform its duties, he being, in the language of the 
record, "at present confined in Montgomery County 
jail." The cause of his incarceration is not stated; it 
was perhaps for nothing worse than inability to pay 
his debts. 

The foundation of the colony had been laid by a 
Catholic nobleman and a band of emigrants mostly of 
the same religious persuasion ; who sought a retreat in 
the New World from a land of persecution, and under 



^(> Old Georgetown. 

whom, says Bancroft, ''religious liberty obtained a 
home, its only home in the wide world. ' ' 

It offered an asylum to the Puritans and all shades 
of dissenters and non-conformists from Virginia and 
other colonies from the persecution to which they were 
subject, and of which they availed themselves so largely 
that they soon outnumbered the Catholics. 

The tolerant spirit which prevailed is evident in the 
form of the oath taken by the early Governors in which 
they pledged themselves ''not to trouble, molest or dis- 
countenance any person whatsoever in said Province 
professing to believe in Jesus Christ for or in respect 
of his or her religion" nor to "make any difference of 
persons in conferring rewards, offices or favors," but 
merely as they should find them faithful and well de- 
serving and "endowed with moral virtues and abilities 
fitting for such rewards, offices and favors. ' ' 

In 1649 "an act concerning religion" was passed 
which declared that "the enforcing of the conscience 
in matters of religion have frequently fallen out to be 
of dangerous consequence" and that, "the better to 
presei^e mutual love and unity," no one professing 
to believe in Jesus Christ should be troubled in the 
free exercise of his religion. 

A writer describing the condition of affairs in the 
colony in 1656, where he then resided, says that "The 
several Opinions and Sects, which lodge within this 
Government, meet not together in mutinous attempts 
to disquiet the power that bears rule" and that "the 
Roman Catholic and Protestant Episcopal (whom the 
world would persuade have proclaimed open wars ir- 
revocably against each other), contrary wise concur 
in an unanimous parallel of friendship." It is almost 
incredible that a colony which had experienced the 
benefits of and prospered under the liberal and wise 



Old Georgetown. 67 

regime of the first Calverts should have ever given 
a place on its statute books to laws conceived in the 
spirit of bigotry and patterned in servile manner upon 
the prescriptive Acts of the British Parliament. 

The condition of affairs which prevailed in the early 
days was happily restored by the Maryland Declara- 
tion of Rights and Constitution adopted in 1776, which 
declared '^that every man having property in, a com- 
mon interest with and an attachment to the community 
ought to have the right of suffrage" and "that as 
it is the duty of every man to worship God in such 
manner as he thinks most acceptable to Him, all per- 
sons professing the Christian religion are equally en- 
titled to protection in their religious liberty," and 
ought not to be molested in person or estate on ac- 
count of their religious profession or practice. 

The Town in the Days of the Revolution. 

During the Revolutionary War Georgetown suffered, 
of course, from the general depression of trade, but 
she was not idle. There is ample evidence that during 
this period all her energies were devoted to the ad- 
vancement of the American cause. 

At a meeting of the inhabitants held at the county 
court-house November 18, 1774, a committee was ap- 
pointed to carry into execution the association agreed 
on by the Continental Congress, and among the names 
are those of John Murdock, Thomas Johns, "William 
Deakins, Jr., Bernard O'Neill, Brooke Beall, Joseph 
Threlkeld, Walter Smith, Thomas Beall of George, 
Francis Deakins, Caspar Schaaf, and Richard Crabbe, 
all of whom lived in Georgetown or near it. On the 
Committee of Correspondence which was appointed 
for the county, Georgetown was represented by Thomas 
Johns, Walter Smith, William Deakins, John Mur- 



68 Old Georgetown. 

dock, Bernard O'Neill, Casper Seliaaf and Thomas 
Crampliin. 

The history of Frederick County, of which the town 
formed part prior to 1776, and of Montgomery County, 
which was in that year created out of the lower part 
of Frederick, during the struggle, is one which the 
people of these counties may well contemplate with 
emotions of patriotic pride. Georgetown was no in- 
significant actor and factor in it. Her forges and smith 
shops resounded with the manufacture of arms; the 
work of recruiting for the service went on continuously; 
she became a great depot for the collection of military 
supplies, and several of her sons attained distinction 
in the Maryland Line, so famous in Revolutionary 
annals. Two companies of riflemen from Frederick 
County, one under the command of Captain ^Michael 
Cresap, and the other under the command of Captain 
Thomas Price, were the first to go to the assistance 
of Massachusetts after the Battle of Bunker Hill, June 
17, 1775. They left Frederick Town on the 18th of 
July, 1775, and marched five hundred and fifty miles 
to Cambridge. 

In January, 1776, the Maryland Convention resolved 
that the Province ''be immediately put in the best 
state of defence," and that a sufficient armed force 
be raised for its protection. John Murdock became 
the Colonel, Thomas Johns the Lieutenant-Colonel, 
William Brooke the First Major, and William Deakins 
the Second ]\Iajor of one of the battalions of Frederick 
County militia raised under this resolution. They 
were all residents of Georgetown or its suburbs, as 
were also Captain Benjamin Spiker and the other 
officers and men of the battalion. 

John Yoast, a Georgetown gunsmith, entered into a 
contract with the Maryland Council of Safety to fur- 



Old Georgetown. 69 

nish a number of muskets. Major William Deakins, 
Jr., of the 29tli Battalion, in a letter to the Council, 
dated at Georgetown December 18, 1776, recommends 
Yoast very highly, saying that he was a man much to 
be depended on and would not deceive the Council; 
that he had a number of hands employed and was well 
prepared to carry on extensively the work of gun- 
making. 

The muskets, as described in the requirements of 
the Council were to be 42 inches in length, | of an 
inch at the bore, 1^ inch diameter at the breech and f 
of an inch at the muzzle, with good double bridle locks, 
black walnut or maple stocks and plain strong brass 
mounting, bayonets with steel blades, 17 inches long, 
steel ramrods, double screws, priming wires and 
brushes fitted thereto, with a pair of brass moulds for 
every 80 muskets, to cast 12 bullets on one side and 
on the other side to cast shot of such size as that the 
muskets will chamber 3 of them. 

Thomas Richardson, whose name is appended to the 
letter to Mr. Johnson, which has been mentioned, was 
a Quaker, but evidently one of the militant kind, for 
he led one of the first companies out of Georgetown 
to the seat of war. Alexander McFadden was the 
first lieutenant and John Peter the second lieutenant 
of this company. Thomas Beall, perhaps the one of 
that name who was afterwards one of the trustees of 
the Federal City, raised a company of riflemen, which 
was assigned to duty in Colonel Moses Rawlings' rifle 
regiment and took part in the engagements around 
New York. This regiment was sent by General Greene 
to reinforce the garrison of Fort Washington, on the 
Hudson. They made a stubborn defense to the attack 
of Knyphausen and Rahl with 4,000 Hessians and 
Waldeckers and (says Scharf, from whom the facts 



70 Old Georgetoxcn. 

in relation to this engagement are taken) lield their 
entrenchments on the north lines against five times 
their number, until, ui the charge finally made by the 
attacking party, besiegers and besieged, owing to the 
indisposition of the riflemen to retreat even when 
overpowered, became mixed together; but their rifles 
having become fouled and useless from frequent dis- 
charges, their colonel wounded, their flanks turned, 
and receiving no support, they were forced back, 
fighting all the way, until within a hundred yards of 
the fort, which soon surrendered. General Greene 
said that if this regiment had been supported, Knyp- 
hausen could not have gained the north lines ; that the 
defense elsewhere was irresolute, but that had it been 
"like that of Rawlings' riflemen, it would well-nigh 
have crippled the enemy. ' ' It cost Knyphausen nearly 
800 men to force the single regiment of Rawlings back. 
The regiment was complimented by General Washing- 
ton for ' ' the great spirit with which it behaved on this 
occasion." 

Captain Leonard M. Deakins' company of Colonel 
Griffith's battalion was recruited from the young men 
of the town and neighborhood and started for the scene 
of war in July of 1776. His brother Francis was en- 
gaged in reciniiting a company at the same time, who 
were supplied with guns and blankets and left George- 
town, taking up their line of march in the same direc- 
tion the following August. 

William Deakins, Jr., the brother of Leonard and 
Francis, above mentioned, was active in various ways 
in the cause. He was one of the "worshipful justices 
of the county" and as such presided at the trials of 
a number of persons who had been indicted for 
"damning Congress," "wishing success to the King's 
arms," "damning Whigs and rebels," and other grave 



Old GeorgetoibTi. 7^ 

offenses against the peace and dignity of the newly 
declared sovereign and independent State. He was, 
as we have seen, the second major of Murdock's 
regiment of militia. His regiment being called to the 
front, he entered upon active service and subsequently 
attained the rank of colonel in the Maryland troops. 
The same rank was attained by the gallant Captain 
Thomas Beall. Another citizen of the town, James 
M. Lingan, whose sad fate in the so-called ''Fed- 
eralist" riots in Baltimore in 1812 made his name 
historic, was a gallant officer in the Maryland Line, 
in which he attained the rank of Lt. Colonel. 

These fragments of the town's history ''in the times 
that tried men's souls" have now been for the first 
time gathered together; they will serve to correct in 
the future any impression which might otherwise pre- 
vail that during the Revolutionary War Georgetown 
had no history to boast of. I am led to say this by 
reason of the fact that General W. H. F. Lee, in re- 
sponse to the address of welcome delivered by Com- 
missioner Wheatley to the visitors from Virginia at 
the celebration which was held in Georgetown over 
the opening of the new free bridge over the Potomac, 
stated, in the midst of a tribute, which was otherwise 
graceful, eloquent and generous to the heritage of 
glories which the old town may justly consider as 
hers, that he had not been able to find that she had 
taken a conspicuous part in the Revolutionary War. 

In March, 1776, a vessel under Captain Conway, 
arrived in the Eastern Branch of the Potomac with 
nearly 6,000 pounds of powder on board, for the Mary- 
land authorities. In a letter from Jonathan Boucher 
to the Council of Safety, dated March 15, he states 
that "the people had become somewhat dispirited on 
account of the want of arms and ammunition, par- 



72 Old Georgetown. 

ticularly the latter," but that since the arrival of 
the powder the change was obvious and "that they 
were now busy casting buck shot and getting their 
fire arms in order." 

The writer expresses the hope that some of the 
powder will be allotted to the locality, as the people 
were apprehensive that an armed force of the enemy 
would proceed up the river to Alexandria. The 
powder was safely landed at Blandensburg. Upon the 
request of George Mason and John Dalton, of the Com- 
mittee of Fairfax County, ten barrels of the powder 
were delivered to them. 

The apprehensions of the people that the Potomac 
would be visited by the vessels of the enemy proved 
to be well founded, but Alexandria and Georgetown 
were not their objective points. 

Under date of July 2G, 1776, the Council of Safety 
wrote to the Delegates in Congress, that the "Fowey" 
and the "Otter" of Dunmore's fleet, with a number of 
vessels having the Tory families on board remain in 
the mouth of the St. Mary's River, and that the "Roe- 
buck" and six or seven other vessels have moved up 
the river as high as Quantico in Virginia where they 
stopped to take in water, that it was reported they 
had landed at William Brent's and burned his house, 
and that they had then crossed the river and landed 
at Colonel Smallwood's on the IMaryland side. 

Lord Dunsmore in a report to Lord Germaine, the 
British Secretary of State, under date of July 31, 1776, 
states that not finding sufficient water at St. George's 
Island he sent the "Roebuck" and the "Dunmore" 
with transports carrying the empty casks, up the river 
and obtained a good supply; that a number of rebels 
had assembled at the house of Brent, who was one of 
their colonels ; that a force from the vessels was landed 



Old Georgetown. 73 

and the rebels fled; that Brent's house was burned 
*'and having done all the mischief in our power we 
reembarked without the loss of a man killed and only 
four or five wounded." He states that they found 
''only three of the bodies of the rebels, but we flatter 
ourselves, there were several more, that the rest had 
carried off, ' ' He does not mention a landing at Small- 
wood 's on the Maryland side of the river. Smallwood 
was also a rebel colonel. 

Aftek the War. 

After the declaration of peace in 1783 the sur- 
vivors of the Georgetown contingent in the military 
service returned to their homes and engaged in busi- 
ness in the town, as did many other officers in the 
Maryland Line not previously residents of it. General 
Uriah Forrest, who was originally from St. Mary's 
County and who lost a leg at Germantown, went to 
London at the close of the war and established there 
the firm of Forrest, Stoddert and Murdock, which im- 
mediately secured a large trade with the Potomac 
planters. He amassed a fortune in London, but re- 
turned to the United States after the location of the 
seat of the Federal Government on the banks of the 
Potomac, and engaged in business in Georgetown. He 
purchased largely of lots in the new city and of prop- 
erty in its vicinity and in the vicinity of Georgetown. 
He built and occupied the large dwelling on the south 
side of Bridge Street, which subsequently passed into 
the ownership and occupancy of the late William Mar- 
bury, the elder. Upon the establishment of the Circuit 
Court of the District of Columbia, in 1801, he was ap- 
pointed its clerk. 

General Forrest's country seat was Rosedale, now 
occupied by one of his descendants— Oak View, the 



74 Old GeorgetoTvn. 

country seat of President Cleveland during his first 
term of office, was built upon a part of General For- 
rest's land. 

Colonel Charles Beatty, of Frederick County, also 
a gallant officer in the ^Maryland Line during the Revo- 
lution, located with his family in Georgetown at the 
close of the war, and engaged in business, as did also 
Benjamin Stoddert, of Prince George's County, who 
became the first Secretar}' of the Navy. 

Mr. Stoddert purchased, about the close of the 
eighteenth century, the square bounded by Prospect, 
Bridge, Fayette and Frederick Streets and erected 
his mansion upon the northeast corner on the bold 
bluff which rises on this corner to a considerable height 
above the river. The magnificent view of the Potomac 
and neighboring part of Virginia which is afforded by 
the locality cannot be surpassed and it was doubtless 
the controlling consideration which influenced Messrs. 
Stoddert, Mason, Templeton, Worthington and others 
in erecting their dwelling houses in this vicinity. 
There was a flavor of Colonial architecture around the 
commodious old mansion, which is still standing, 
although changed in appearance. The property be- 
longed to and was occupied by the late Dr. John L. 
Kidwell for many years prior to his death. 

That the town enjoyed a large foreign trade just 
after the Revolution may well be inferred from the 
fact that the following vessels, among many others, 
plied regularly between her port and the ports of 
England, viz.: ''Charlotte," "Potomac Planter," 
' * Eleanor, " ' ' Washington, " ' ' Betsey, " ' ' Sally, ' ' 
** Maryland," "Nantis," "Lady Mary," and the 
"Changeable." 

The "Maniand, " which was a vessel of 400 tons 
burthen, was the first to sail from the City of Wash- 



Old Georgetown. 75 

ington after its establishment, with a full cargo and 
bound for a foreign port; she sailed from Barry's 
wharf on the Eastern Branch laden with flour and 
bound for a foreign market, in the year 1799. 

In 1788, Thomas Corcoran, the father of the late 
W. W. Corcoran, stopped for a few days in George- 
town while on his way to Richmond, with a view to 
permanently locating at the latter place. He was so 
pleased with the appearances of business activity and 
commercial enterprise at Georgetown that he con- 
cluded to remain. At this time, he stated that there 
were in the harbor ten square rigged vessels, two of 
them being ships, and that a small brig from Amster- 
dam was taking in tobacco from a warehouse on Rock 
Creek, at a point below the present P Street bridge. 

Georgetown's Former. Merchant Marine, 

The early part of the last century, even the first half 
of it, was a period of great prosperity for the town. 
All branches of business flourished. The inspection of 
flour in 1820 rose to 107,320 barrels. The town became 
a great fish market. The yield of the Potomac shad 
and herring fisheries was enormous. Georgetown sent 
large quantities of fish to distant points in Maryland, 
Virginia and Pennsylvania. The finest shad in those 
days brought $5.00 per hundred and herring 75 cents 
per thousand ; at times so great was the supply that no 
sale could be had for them at any price and the farmers 
hauled them away by wagon loads and used them to 
fertilize their lands. 

These were the days of the Conestoga wagons with 
their equipment of four and six splendid horses, with 
musical bells, entering the town in long lines, freighted 
with country produce which was exchanged for other 
commodities. It was a common sight for High Street 



76 Old Georgetown. 

(now Wisconsin Avenue) from Road Street to Water 
Street, and for Bridge (now M) Street, from High 
Street far out on the road to the Little Falls, to be filled 
with them. Herring Hill, the section of the town along 
Rock Creek near the P Street bridge, got its name from 
the great quantities of herrings which were caught 
there. 

The Georgetown Exporting and Importing Company 
was extensively engaged in trade to the West Indies, 
using in the service several large vessels, the '* Eagle, " 
the "Shenandoah," the "Katharine Jackson" and the 
"Caledonia." The firm of F. and A. H. Dodge, with 
the "Fidelia" and the "Chase," was also engaged in 
the same trade. 

By acts of Congress, approved July 31, 1789, and 
March 2, 1799, to regulate the collection of the duties 
on the tonnage "of Ships and vessels" and on goods, 
wares and merchandise imported into the United States, 
certain districts, ports and officers were provided for, 
among the districts being the district of Georgetown, 
to include "all the waters and shores from Pomonky 
creek on the north side of Potomac River to the head 
of the navigable waters of said river, ' ' and for which a 
collector was to be appointed "to reside at Georgetown 
which shall be the Sole port of Entry." 

From 1801 to 1831 the sum of $520,000 was collected 
in duties upon foreign merchandise, and from 1790 to 
1801 probably $100,000 more at the port. 

In the following table compiled from the records of 
the Georgetown Custom House are given the names of 
the vessels owned in the town and comprising its mer- 
chant marine during the early part of the last century, 
together with the names of the residents of the town 
by whom they were owned. The list is accurate so far 
as it goes, but it is not complete as the early records in 
the Custom House were loosely kept. 



Old Georgetown. 77 

''Atalanta," built in 1809; owned by Washington 
Bowie, Clement Smith and John Kurtz; burden, 380 
32/100 tons ; James D. Woodside, master. 

^'American," built in 1806 for Daniel Kurtz and 
Henry Smoot, Jr. ; burden, 48 88/95 tons ; Henry Smoot, 

''Ann," built in 1805; John Eliason, owner; burden, 
123 25/95 tons ; B. Wood, master. 

''Adeline," built in 1807 for Francis Dodge of 
Georgetown, and Robert Dodge of Newburyport, Mas- 
sachusetts; burden, 132 46/95 tons; John Souther, 

"Bellona," owner Vincent J. King; master, Joseph 
Middleton; 'burden 70 66/95 tons. This was a British 
vessel, captured and condemned as a prize, and licensed 
June 28, 1815. 

"Betsy," built in 1801 for John Wheelright; burden, 
23 31/95 tons ; Robert Gibson, master. 

"Henry Clay," built at Georgetown in 1816 ; Richard 
Parrot, owner; burden, 93 51/100 tons; Bartholomew 
Wood, master. 

"Ceres," built in 1806; John I. Stull and John fe. 
Williams,' owners; burden, 98 14/95 tons; Leonard 
Smith, master. 

"Coquette," built in 1816 for Joel Cruttenden and 
others; burden, 99 55/95 tons; Peter Vail, master. 

"Catharine," built in 1810 for Henry Smoot and 
sailed by him; burden, 33 60/95 tons. 

"Caledonia," built in 1828; owners, Walter Smith, 
Clement Smith, Francis Dodge and E. M. Linthicum; 
burden, 647 61/95 tons ; Hazadiah Coffin, master. 

"Francis Depau," built in 1833; owners, Walter 
Smith, Clement Smith, Francis Dodge and William S. 
Nichols, Sabret E. Scott and Alexander H. Marbury: 
burden, 595 82/95 tons; Clarence A. Foster, master. 

6 



78 Old Georgetown. 

''Eagle," owned, on Xovember 1, 1828, by Walter 
Smith and Henry B. Rose; master, William Morrill; 
burden, 395 tons. This was a British vessel captured 
August 12, 1812, and condemned. Henry B. Rose was 
at one time her master. 

** Eagle," built in 1805; owner and master, John 
McPherson ; burden 27 63/95 tons. 

' ' Eliza, ' ' built in 1808 ; owner and master, Alexander 
Semmes ; burden, 77 5/95 tons. 

''Eliza Ann," built in 1807 for Henry McPherson, 
by whom she was sailed ; burden, 25 56/95 tons. 

"Elizabeth," built in 1817; owner, Samuel McKen- 
ney; burden, 119 tons; William Loosemore, master. 

"Farmer's Friend," built in 1816 for Richard T. and 
Alexander Semmes; burden 7-4 33/95 tons; master, 
Alexander Semmes. 

"Fortitude," built in 1811 for Joshua Ellis; burden, 
21 25/95 tons ; Richard Glover, master. 

"Henry," built in 1809 for John Pritchet and by 
whom she was sailed ; burden 51 41/95 tons. 

"Hope and Polly," built in 1826; owners, Sabret E. 
Scott, Francis Dodge and others; burden, 96 tons; E. 
Baker, master. 

"Hornet," built in 1816; owners, John and William 
Lipscomb; burden, 88 55/95 tons; John Dellanare, 
master. 

"John," built in 1800 for Ezra Simpson by whom 
she was sailed ; burden, 75 53/95 tons. 

' ' Katharine Jackson, ' ' built in 1833 ; owners, Walter 
Scott, Clement Smith, John Carter, Walter Smith, E. 
M. Linthicum, 0. M. Linthicum, John Davidson, Francis 
Dodge, Jr., Joseph L. Peabody and George Parker; 
burden, 456 94/95 tons ; John Peabody, master. 

"Jane," built in 1820; owner, James C. Wilson; 
burden, 70 tons; master, Gustavus Harrison. 



Old Georgetown. 79 

''Liberty," built in 1815 for Richard Parrot; bur- 
den, 79 91/95 tons ; Alexis Luckett, master. 

''General Lingan," built at Georgetown in 1812 by 
William Doughty, master ship builder, for Washing- 
ton Bowie and John Kurtz; burden, 363 76/95 tons; 
William Weston, master. 

"Lottery," built in 1818 for John Peter, William G. 
Ridgeley and Gustavus Harrison; burden, 57 18/95 
tons ; Leonard Marbury, master. 

"Levisa," built in 1811 for Ebeneezer Eliason and 
Henry McPherson of Georgetown, and Benjamin Her- 
shey of Montgomery Co., Md.; burden 73 65/95 tons; 
Spenser Grayson, master. 

"Leonidas," built in 1820; Alexander Semmes, 
owner ; burden, 95 82/100 tons. 

"Maria," built in 1808; owners, Walter Smith and 
Clement Smith; burden 104 14/95 tons; John Nelson, 
master. 

"Margaret," built in 1816; owners, William McKen- 
ney, William G. Ridgeley, Gustavus Harrison and 
Raphael Jones; burden, 78 75/95 tons; Bartholomew 
Wood, master. This vessel was lost with all on board 
on a return trip from the West Indies. 

"James Madison," built in 1816 for Alexander and 
Ignatius Semmes ; burden, 55 13/95 tons. 

"James Monroe," built in the Eastern Branch in 
1815 for Washington Bowie and John Kurtz; burden, 
127 50/95 tons ; James D. Woodside, master. 

' ' Mary Elizabeth, ' ' built in 1820 ; owner, John Lacy ; 
burden, 52 tons ; William Loosemore, master. 

"Malvina," built in 1814; owners, William McKen- 
ney and James C. Wilson; burden, 74 75/95 tons; 
Lemuel C. Neill, master. 

' ' Mary, ' ' built in 1816 ; owners, John Dellanare and 
Henry Fendall ; burden, 92 58/95 tons ; John Dellanare, 
master. 



8o Old Georgetown. 

** Mercury," built in 1819; owner, Levin Stewart; 
burden, 88 55/95 tons; George Stinchcomb, master. 

"Margaret's Son," built in 1822; owner and master, 
John Lacy; burden, 47 48/95 tons. This vessel was at 
one time the U. S. schooner * 'Jackal." 

"Ossipee," built in 1810; owners, John I. Still and 
John S. Williams; burden, 291 3/95 tons; William Wil- 
liams, master. 

"Olympia," built in 1819; owners, Richard Parrot 
and John Tayloe; burden, 199 51/95 tons; Alexander 
Rutherford, master. 

'■ '■ Presage, ' ' built in 1808 ; owners, Washington Bowie, 
John Kurtz, Clement Smith and Walter Smith ; burden, 
155 30/95 tons ; Alexander M. Rose, master. 

"Polly," built in 1801 for Samuel Smoot, by whom 
she was sailed; burden 30 36/95 tons. 

"Potomac," built in 1830; owners, Francis Dodge, 
Jr., John Davidson and Roswell Woodward; burden, 
147 19/95 tons ; Paul Baker, master. 

"Planter's Friend," built in 1806; owner, Henry 
McPherson; burden, 33 13/95 tons; Robert Russell, 
master. 

"Panopea," built in 1816; owner, Walter Smith; 
burden, 205 tons ; Eleasur Crabtree, master. 

"Rebecca," built in 1811; owner, Ignatius Luckett, 
by whom she was sailed ; burden, 21 35/95 tons. 

"Republican," built in 1805 for John B. and Raphael 
Boarman; burden, 40 88/95 tons; Charles Arnold, 
master. 

"Resolution," built in 1808 for John McPherson; 
burden 29 tons; Charles Arnold, master. 

"Rosanna," built in 1796 for Alexander Smoot; 
burden, 94 63/95 tons; Elijah Hefferton, master. 

"Renown," built in 1827; owners, Roswell Wood- 
ward of Georgetown, and others, non-residents ; burden, 
106 92/95 tons ; Abel Stannard, master. 



Old Georgetown. 81 

"Rubicon," built in 1825; owners, Sabret E. Scott, 
Francis Dodge of Georgetown, and others, non-resi- 
dents ; burden, 120 tons ; John Stetson, master. 

''Rambler," built in 1828; owners, Francis Dodge, 
Francis Dodge, Jr., of Georgetown, and others, non- 
residents ; burden, 121 tons ; Thomas Colley, master. 

''Rambler," built in 1802; owner, John Brent; bur- 
den, 26 tons ; Charles Chiseldine, master. 

"Eleanor H. Semmes," built in 1821; Alexander 
Semmes, owner and master; burden, 122 tons. 

"Shenandoah," built in 1823; owners, Walter and 
Clement Smith; burden 475 49/95 tons; Alexander 
Rose, master. 

"James G. Stacy," built in 1825; owners, Roswell 
Woodward, George Lowrey and Sabret E. Scott; bur- 
den, 74 74/95 tons ; John R. Mason, master. 

"Sallie," built in 1799; owner, Joseph Radcliff; 
burden 40 10/95 tons ; Charles Minitree, master. 

"Elizabeth Sturgis," built in 1817; owners, Walter 
Smith of Georgetown, and William G. Adams of Alex- 
andria, Va. ; burden 160 55/95 tons ; Leonard Marbury, 
master. 

" Traveller, " built in 1805 for James Cassin; burden, 
104 11/95 tons ; Josias M. Speak, master. 

"Trenton," built in 1815 for John I. Stull and John 
S. Williams; burden, 93 tons; Robert W. Beaseley, 
master. 

"Two Sisters," built in 1800; owner and master, 
Joshua Ellis ; burden 20 10/95 tons. 

"Talbot," built in 1800; owners, Alexander Suter 
and Joseph Middleton ; burden, 40 88/95 tons ; Joseph 
Middleton, master. 

"Ulysses," built in 1818; owner, Walter Smith; bur- 
den, 392 tons ; Alexander M. Rose, master. 

"Union," built in 1797 for Joseph B. Parsons of 



82 Old Georgetown. 

Georgetown, and George Lake of Washington ; burden, 
24 21/95 tons ; Edward Arnold, master. 

**Villorious, " built in 1812 for Washington Bowie, 
John Kurtz and Robert W. Beaseley; burden, 169 
57/95 tons ; R. W. Beaseley, master. 

"Volunteer," built in 1820; owner, Walter Smith; 
burden, 167 tons ; Samuel Gover, master. 

''Vernon," built in 1824; owners, Joel Cruttenden 
and Daniel Wilson; burden, 68 tons; Harrison Harris, 
master. 

"William," built in 1804; owners, Richard Parrot 
and Daniel Renner ; burden 60 59/95 tons ; James Spil- 
man, master. 

' * George Washington, ' ' built in 1814 ; owner, Richard 
Parrot; burden, 58 58/95 tons; Henry G. Robinson, 
master. 

The Town Incorporated. 

The commissioners held their last meeting at the 
house of Mr. George Baker, January 20, 1789, after 
having for nearly forty years attended to the affairs of 
the town. Robert Peter served on the board from 
1757 to 1789, a period of thirty-two years. Adam 
Stewart, a member of the board when the Revolutionai'y 
War began, was a Tory and left the country for Eng- 
land. He was the owner of a tract of land which was 
confiscated by the State. 
X An amusing story is told by a descendant of one of 
the first Scotch settlers, who was also one of the com- 
missioners of the town. The latter sent a particularly 
black specimen of a negro girl home to his mother 
in Scotland as a waiting maid or attendant. In the 
course of time a vessel came up the Potomac having the 
girl on board and also a letter from the old lady to her 
son. In this letter she thanked him for his filial remem- 



Old Georgetown. 83 

brance and went on to say that she had not been able to 
accomplish anything in the way of a change in the 
appearance of the girl; that she had washed, and 
washed and washed and that the more she washed the 
blacker the thing got, ' ' and that as the girl did not take 
kindly to her new surroundings and wished to return, 
she had sent her back. 

The town was incorporated under the name of ''The 
Mayor, Recorder, Aldermen and Common Council of 
Georgetown, ' ' on December 25, 1789 ; Eobert Peter was 
made Mayor by the act of incorporation, John Mackall 
Gantt, Recorder, and Brooke Beall, Bernard O'Neill, 
Thomas Beall of George, James Macubbin Lingan and 
John Threlkeld, Aldermen; and ten persons to be 
elected viva voce were to be Common Council men, who 
were required to have visible property to the value of 
£100, and the voters were to be " freemen above the age 
of 21 years having visible property within the State of 
the value of £30 Current Money" and who "had resided 
in the town for one whole year. ' ' 

The first meeting of the corporation of which there 
is any record was held November 28, 1791, at the house 
of Joseph Semmes, at which Thomas Beall, Mayor; 
Uriah Forrest and Daniel Reintzell, Aldermen, and 
Valentine Reintzell, Jr., Thomas Corcoran, Charles 
Beatty and James Clagett, Common Councilmen, ap- 
peared and took their seats. On the following day 
Robert Peter and Charles Magruder appeared and 
took their seats and were fined 3s. and 9d. each for 
non-attendance in due time. 

On May 2, 1791, the people of the town witnessed a 
novel spectacle. The ship Termageant, belonging to 
the house of the Messrs. Clagett, which was anchored 
in the stream off the town, was discovered to be on fire. 
The inhabitants and the seamen in the harbor quickly 



84 Old Georgetown. 

collected, but were deterred from efforts to extinguish 
the flames by knowledge of the fact that the cargo con- 
sisted in large part of powder. 

As the flames jorogressed and reached the powder, a 
terrific exjDlosion took place, which shook all the houses 
in the town. Cinders and pieces of the ship flew in 
every direction; and the extensive tobacco warehouse 
of Francis and Charles Lowndes, a short distance from 
the water, was saved with great difficulty. 

On the first Monday of January, 1792, Uriah Forrest 
was elected Mayor and Robert Peter and Charles 
Worthington were elected Aldermen. At a meeting 
held on the twenty-seventh of March, 1792, Peter Casa- 
nave and Charles Beatty appeared as Aldermen and 
Benjamin Stoddert and William King as Councilmen. 
A supplement was passed to an ordinance for the re- 
assessment of all the property in the town and a bill 
was also passed to levy a tax upon dogs, whereupon 
in the quaint language of the journal, ''The house dis- 
continues and dissolves for the present." 

John Threlkeld was elected Mayor Januaiy 7, 1793, 
and Peter Casanave was elected Mayor January 6, 

1794, and at a meeting on the ninth of May, Adam King 
and John M. Beatty appeared as Councilmen, and 
Gantt resigning as Recorder, William Hammond Dor- 
sey was elected in his stead. On the fifth of January, 

1795, William Turner was elected Mayor and at this 
meeting authority was given for the removal of that 
part of the jail built for debtors for the greater con- 
venience of finishing the market house. 

The previous meetings of the corporation are silent 
as to the jail, but at this one a committee was appointed 
to procure a lot for the purpose of building a new one 
for the use of the corporation; and notice was given 
that the next General Assembly would be asked to vest 



Old Georgetown. 85 

in the corporation a right to the county wharf, to the 
front wall of the streets and alleys terminating in the 
river, and to provide that the fines arising in the 
Mayor's court be appropriated to the use of the cor- 
poration, and to give said Court the right to license 
ordinary keepers and retailers in Greorgetown. This 
right was then vested in Montgomery County Court. 

The meeting adjudged a house built by Adam King, 
one of its members, in one of the streets as a nuisance^ 
and rather inconsistently allowed it to remain, provided 
Mr. King paid an annual rent to the corporation of 
fifteen pounds. 

The corporation elected Daniel Reintzell Mayor on 
the tenth of October, 1796, and John Mason, John 
French and Anthony Gozler took their seats as coun- 
cilmen. The next meeting of the corporation was held 
at the house of Clement Sewall and from the proceed- 
ings it appears that the constables of the town, Igna- 
tius Newton and John Sanders, had in their custody 
a certain Michael Dulaney and a certain Matthew 
Dulaney on suspicion of having burned the records of 
the tobacco warehouse, and "it being well ascertained 
that the county jail is not in a state to insure their 
safe keeping, and that it is the general wish of the 
inhabitants that measures should be taken to secure 
the persons of men who appear to have been guilty 
of so heinous a crime"; the constables were directed 
to keep the prisoners in their custody "ironed at hand 
and foot in one of their own houses or in some other 
place of safety, under a constant guard by day and 
night by four men well armed until the adjourned 
county court to be held at Montgomery County Court 
House on the second of January next," and then to 
deliver them to the sheriff of the county. Lloyd Beall 
was elected Mayor January 2; 1797, and John T. Mason 



86 Old Georgetoxcn. 

Recorder in place of William Hammond Dorsey, who 
had resigned. 

On November 3, 1797, an ordinance was passed 
concerning gambling and a petition was sent to the 
Legislature of the State asking for some changes in 
the charter so as to allow the reelection of a person 
once before elected as mayor, etc. The Legislature 
granted the petition and passed an act for the purpose 
which also authorized the corporation to control va- 
grants, loose and disorderly persons, and provided 
that if any such were committed and at the expira- 
tion of the sentence should not pay the amount of their 
fines and prison fees that the sheriff, with the consent 
of the mayor, might sell such persons as servants for 
any time not exceeding four months. 

At the meeting held February 26, 1798, a committee 
was appointed to examine the condition of the bridge 
on Falls Street and to have it pulled down if, in their 
opinion, in case of a freshet, it would endanger the 
Market House. This bridge was located on the north 
side of Falls, now M Street, near the present Potomac 
Street, across a ravine which commenced at a spring 
near what is now the corner of Wisconsin Avenue and 
Q Streets. The ravine took a southerly direction to 
Falls Street and then to the river. The Market House 
of that daj", a frame structure, was built over the ra- 
vine about where the present M Street market house 
stands. For about sixty years this ravine has been 
filled up, arched and converted into a sewer; back of 
the late Dr. Loockerman's residence on First Street 
there was in this ravine a pond of considerable depth 
and area which was used by the boys of McLeod's 
School for bathing and swimming. 

The expenses of the corporation for the next year 
were estimated and the estimate, which is as follows, 



Old Georgetown. 87 

shows the economical lines upon which it was con- 
ducted : 

For Jail rent $ 80.00 

For a house for a common hall 40.00 

For Clerk of the Corporation : . . 25.00 

For Clerk of the Corporation Court $ 25.00 

For MBc Crier Corporation Court 20.00 

For Prosecutor Corporation Court 20.00 65.00 

For two Constables at 30 dollars each.... 60.00 

For Clerk of the Market 50.00 

For Street repairs 1,005.00 

Total $1,335.00 

To be defrayed through fines deriAcd from: 
a tax of 3 s on the 100 pounds upon the 

assessable property $1,066,661 

Revenue from stalls of the Market 80.00 

Revenue from tax on dogs 80.00 

Four billiard tables at 20 80.00 

Fines, &c 80.00 



$1,386,662 



That the town was occasionally treated to a theat- 
rical performance appears from the fact that on April 
9, 1799, Marlborough Sterling Hamilton, on behalf of 
himself and company of comedians then in the town, 
petitioned the corporation to remit part of the tax 
they were obliged to pay, which was a tax of six dol- 
lars nightly for each performance. The law was 
graciously suspended for their benefit until the thir- 
tieth instant. 

Washington Unaccommodating and Georgetown 
Sarcastic. 

On May 18, 1799, a committee was appointed to 
wait upon the commissioners of the City of Washing- 
ton and in the name and on the behalf of the corpora- 



88 Old Georgetown. 

tion to inform them of ineffectual efforts already made 
to obtain an instrument for levelling the streets, and 
to solicit the commissioners to accommodate the cor- 
poration with the loan of their instrument for a few 
days. The committee reported that they had waited 
upon the commissioners of the Federal City and could 
not effect the loan of the instrument upon any other 
terms than the following: 

"It must be used by the Surveyor of the City {of Wash- 
ington) and for two days in a week for a term of six days 
only. That if the business of the Corporation was not ef- 
fected in this time, upon a future application a further loan 
might be effected. ' ' 

Thereupon it was resolved ''that the thanks of 
this corporation be returned to the commissioners of 
the City of Washington for the extreme politeness and 
attention with which they have been pleased to ac- 
commodate this town by the offer of a loan of the 
instrument belonging to the citizens of Washington 
for so great a length of time, as well as for their 
condescending kindness in pointing out to this cor- 
poration unasked a proper person to do their work. 

"Resolved, that during these days for which the Commis- 
sioners have determined to loan the instniment in question it 
cannot but happen that the interests of the City must be 
materially affected by being for so long a time deprived of 
the use of it, and that it Avould be highly ungenerous and 
improper to profit by the liberality of the gentlemen who 
superintend the affairs of the City to their evident disadvan- 
tage. That the Commissioners of the streets of Georgetown 
be directed not to accept the loan of the said instrument 
unless it should be found that the graduation of the whole 
town can be effected in the space of half an hour and should 
this not be found practicable they are authorized to purchase 



Old Georgetown. 89 

a levelling instrument with the funds placed at their disposal 
and that a copy of these resolutions be transmitted to the 
Commissioners of Washington," 

The troubles of the committee and of the corpora- 
tion with regard to the levelling instrument did not 
end here. 

At a meeting held on the twenty-eighth of March, 
1800, the street commissioners reported that soon after 
they were empowered to procure an instrument for 
levelling the streets they first obtained from a com- 
petent judge a complete description of such an instru- 
ment and empowered John Mason, one of their num- 
ber, to write to his correspondent in Philadelphia, 
requesting him to purchase or have made a complete 
street level, by said description, provided the same 
could be had for from 50 to 70 dollars. That they were 
informed that no such instrument could be had in 
Philadelphia, but that Mr. Rittenhouse, a mathe- 
matical instrument maker near Philadelphia, would 
undertake to make one and thereupon Mr. Biddle was 
requested to direct it to be made ; that they were disap- 
pointed at not getting it in time to use it in the fall 
and that Mr. Mason had received a letter from Mr. 
Biddle dated January 16 saying that the instrument 
was completed and brought to him ; that it was a very 
complete one and that the price was 300 dollars. 

The committee were very much astonished at this 
price and, finding that they had limited it to 70 dol- 
lars, they thereupon wrote to Mr. Biddle, suggesting 
that Mr. Rittenhouse dispose of it otherwise, and that 
the price so far exceeded their limits that they were 
under no obligation to take it; but, if it could be 
obtained for 100 dollars they would pay that price. 

A reply was received from Mr. Rittenhouse, stating 



po Old Georgetown. 

that it had been executed at considerable expense and 
with great care, and saying that as a misunderstand- 
ing had taken place he would deduct 50 dollars; the 
committee submitted the matter to the corporation 
for its action, and the corporation, upon duly consider- 
ing it, concluded that they were not bound to take the 
instrument, by contract, and expressed their regrets 
that they were precluded from purchasing it by the 
limited state of their funds. 

A Yellow Fevek Scare. 

The prevalence of the yellow fever at Norfolk and 
Baltimore in the year 1800, excited the liveliest feel- 
ings of apprehension in the town. On August 30, 
Thomas Corcoran and Adam King were appointed a 
committee "for removing a certain person by the 
name of Clotworthy O'Neale, now confined with a 
fever in a house on the Water Side, who arrived here 
in the public stage from the southward this morning." 
The committee were directed to cause him to be re- 
moved "to such place as they may think proper, so 
as to prevent a contagion of the disorder, with which 
he is now confined." On September 17, another com- 
mittee was appointed, consisting of Charles Worthing- 
ton, Thomas Corcoran and John Reintzell, whose duty 
it was made during the prevalence of the fever at 
Norfolk and Baltimore to frequently visit the different 
taverns, boarding houses and stage offices and make 
inquiry if any person who may come within the same 
be in a situation to communicate said fever, and to 
remove suspected or afflicted persons immediately 
from town ; and still another committee was appointed, 
consisting of Anthony Reintzell, Charles A. Beatty 
and John ^Mitchell, to diligently attend the wharves 
and landing places of the town and to visit all vessels 



Old Georgetoun. 91 

whicli may come into the river, and if infected persons 
are found to prevent them from landing. 

The committee on the situation of Clotworthy 'Neale 
doubtless performed their duty as considerately as 
circumstances would permit, but there is a suggestion 
of grim humor not intended by them, of course, in 
the informal but expressive report which they pre- 
sented in the shape of the following bill, when taken 
in connection with the terms of the resolution by 
which they were appointed: 

"Sept. 1800 Corpn. of Georgetown, Dr. 

' ' To cash paid for digging one grave 7 s 6 d. " 

The committee could have found no place more ef- 
fective than the grave for preventing a contagion of 
the disorder with which the unfortunate 'Neale was 
aflSicted. 

The fate of 'Neale, dying thus among strangers, 
was an exceedingly sad one. He had been dispatched 
by his brother, a boot and shoe merchant in Baltimore, 
with a vessel loaded with stock, to establish a branch 
store in Richmond. There he caught the disorder; 
he was anxious to return to his home, but was refused 
passage on vessels; he determined to try to reach 
Baltimore by travelling overland. He was denied ac- 
commodations at the houses along the route, and com- 
pelled to sleep in barns. When he entered Georgetown 
he was past recovery from the virulent disease, which 
had been aggravated by exposure and lack of at- 
tention. 

The Founding op the City of Washington. 

About the time the town was incorporated an event 
was impending which was to exercise a great influence 
upon its destiny. 



92 Old Georgetown. 

In the year 1789 the subject of a location for the 
permanent seat of the government of the United 
States largely occupied the attention of Congress, 
and various places were active in competition for the 
honor of being selected, among them Baltimore, An- 
napolis, Philadelphia, New York, Wright's Ferry, on 
the Susquehanna; Yorktown, west of the Susquehanna; 
Harrisburg, on the Susquehanna; Heading, on the 
Schuylkill ; Germantown, in the neighborhood of Phila- 
delphia; Wilmington, Del., and Georgetown, on the 
Potomac. On Tuesday, September 8, 1789, a petition 
was presented to the House of Representatives from 
sundry inhabitants of Georgetown, containing an offer 
to place themselves and fortunes under the exclusive 
jurisdiction of Congress in case that town should be 
selected as the permanent seat of the government of 
the United States, and in the Senate on Monday, June 
28, 1790, a representation of Robert Peter, in behalf 
of himself and other inhal)itants of Georgetown, stat- 
ing the town to be exceedingly commodious and eligible 
for the seat of government was read. An act was 
passed on July 16, 1790, for the establishment of the 
permanent seat of government of the United States 
at some place on the Potomac between the mouth of 
the Eastern Branch and the Conogocheague. The act 
authorized the President to appoint three commission- 
ers who, under his direction, should survey and by 
proper metes and bounds define and limit a district 
or territory not exceeding ten miles . square within 
said limits. 

The newspapers of October 26, 1790, chronicle the 
fact of the arrival at Georgetown on the previous 
Friday of President Washington, and that in company 
with the principal gentlemen of the town he set out to 
view the adjacent country in order to fix upon a 



Old Georgetown. 93 

future situation for ''The Grand Columbian Federal 
City," and that he left on Saturday for the Great 
Falls and Conogocheague ; the papers also state that 
since the visit of the President bets run high in favor 
of Georgetown. 

The Georgetown Weekly Record of March 12, 1791, 
contain the following items : 

''Some time last month arrived in this town Major Andrew. 
Ellicott, a gentleman of superior astronomical abilities. He 
was appointed by the President of the United States to lay 
off a tract of land ten miles square on the Potomac for the 
use of Congress. He is now engaged in this business and 
hopes soon to accomplish the object of his mission. He is 
attended by Benjamin Banniker, an Ethiopian, whose abilities 
as a surveyor and astronomer clearly prove that Mr. Jeffer- 
son's concluding that race of men were void of mental en- 
dowments was without foundation." 

"Wednesday evening arrived in this town Major Long- 
font, a French gentleman employed by the President of the 
United States to survey the lands contiguous to Georgetown, 
where the federal city is to be built. His skill in matters of 
this kind is justly extolled by all disposed to give merit its 
proper tribute of praise. He is earnest in the business and 
hopes to be able to lay a plat of that parcel of land before the 
President upon his arrival in this town." 

Both of these gentlemen, L 'Enfant and Ellicott, 
played leading parts in the events which attended the 
founding of the City of Washington. The original 
l^lan of the city was prepared by L 'Enfant and sub- 
mitted in 1791 by President Washington to Congress, 
which was then in session in Philadelphia, where the 
plan was greatly admired. Ellicott assisted L 'Enfant 
in making surveys in the city and thus became familiar 
with the details of the plan. 

• The appointment of L 'Enfant in the first instance 
7 






94 Old Georgetown. 

directly by the President led him to suppose that he 
was accountable to no other authority. He refused to 
recognize the right of the Commissioners of the city 
to control his actions, and this disagreement led to his 
withdrawal from connection with its affairs; he took 
his plat with him, and the Commissioners were left 
without a plan. He was succeeded as surveyor of the 
city by Ellicott, who was directed by the President 
to prepare a plan. As L 'Enfant refused the use of the 
original it could not be exactly reproduced. Ellicott, 
however, was able from his knowledge of it to prepare 
a plan, which, though somewhat variant from the orig- 
inal, was substantially in accordance with its design, 
and became the plan of the city. 

Major L 'Enfant always felt that he had been un- 
justly deprived of the credit to which he was entitled 
as the projector of the plan, and although Ellicott is 
not to blame in the matter, it is impossible to read 
the memorials of the time without a feeling that upon 
the whole L 'Enfant, who had entered upon his duties 
with a zeal and enthusiasm which was remarkable, was 
not fairly treated. 

The plan upon which the capital has developed and 
grown within the past 115 years into a marvelously 
beautiful city, whose attractions are increasing every 
year, is undoubtedly his. The major's memory has 
been too long neglected when we consider the double 
claim which he has on the American people, especially 
those of the City of Washington, as a gallant soldier 
of the Revolution and as the designer of this plan. 
It was prepared with the idea and with the expecta- 
tion on the part of the founders of the city that the 
national government would devote the same care and 
attention to the beautification of its capital that other 
nations displayed with respect to theirs. It was pro- 



Old Georgetown. 95 

jected upon a scale of magnificence in the width of the 
streets which made it impossible for the municipality 
unaided to make provision for the paving and keep- 
ing in repair of sidewalks and carriageways of the ex- 
traordinary width contemplated, yet for upwards of 
three quarters of a century the corporation of the 
City of Washington exhausted its funds in a hopeless 
effort to do so. It was not until several years after 
the Civil war that Congress awakend to a realization 
of its duty in the premises. 

The city was long criticised as the ' ' city of magnifi- 
cent distances." A witty French lady in the early 
part of this century referred to Washington as a " city 
of streets without houses," and to Georgetown as a 
*'city of houses without streets." When we consider 
the plan of Washington the reason for the first portion 
of her remarks is obvious. The latter portion was 
prompted by the fact that Georgetown was built upon 
a succession of hills, and the lack of uniformity at 
the time in the grade of the streets gave an irregular 
appearance to the houses. 

Major L 'Enfant. 
The career of Major P. C. L 'Enfant deserves more 
than the passing notice which can now be given to him. 
He was born in Paris August 2, 1754, and died June 14, 
1825, at Green Hill, the seat of William Dudley Digges, 
in Prince George's County, Md., just beyond the Dis- 
trict line. He came to America with Monsieur Du- 
coudray in 1777, during the Revolutionary War. He 
served as a volunteer and was commissioned as a cap- 
tain of engineers in the service of the United States 
in 1778, and was attached to the light infantry in the 
army of the south ; at the assault on Savannah by Gen- 
eral Lincoln, he commanded the advance guard of the 



96 Old Georgetown. 

American column and behaved with great gallantry, 
performing the notable feat of leading his men under 
a hea\^ fire to the wooden abbatis and applying com- 
bustibles. He received a gun-shot wound and fell on 
the field of battle ; he was made a prisoner at the siege 
of Charleston, paroled and later exchanged for a Cap- 
tain De Heyden of the Anspach Yeagers, who were 
part of the Hessian contingent in the British service, 
and rejoined the army under Washington, where he 
served as engineer. He was granted a pension of 300 
livres by the French King Louis XVI, in consideration 
of the utility of his services and of the wounds which 
he had received during the American war. In 1783 he 
was brevetted as major of engineers by Congress. 

After the Revolutionary War he was employed in 
remodeling for the use of Congress the old city hall in 
New York, where General Washington was inaugurated 
as President, and although the expense incident to the 
completion of the elaborate design was so great as to 
involve the city in financial embarrassment yet his 
work was considered to be of such high artistic and 
architectural merit that he received the thanks of the 
corporation and the freedom of the city, together with 
ten acres of land belonging to the city ''near Provost 
lane, ' ' which latter he politely declined. He is described 
as- a man marked by a stern independence of character 
in all circumstances and conditions ; independent to 
obstinacy; one whom, no motive of interest or tempta- 
tion of convenience could sway from his purpose or 
induce to alter his plan to suit either the taste or the 
necessities of his employers. 

This was well illustrated in the case of his employ- 
ment by Robert Morris, the Revolutionary financier, to 
design and superintend the erection of a "palace," as 
a proposed residence for Mr. Morris in Philadelphia 



Old Georgetown. 97 

was called. L 'Enfant prepared a design of a very 
elaborate character and costly in construction. Before 
the building appeared above ground it is said that a 
great deal of money had been spent upon it and Mr. 
Morris met with some difficulty in providing funds for 
its further progress. He requested Major L 'Enfant 
to make some changes with a view to reducing the cost 
and was met with a point-blank refusal. As a result 
the erection of the building was brought to a stop and 
the major left the city. 

Subsequently Mr. Morris, being relieved from em- 
barrassment and in funds, wrote to L 'Enfant advising 
him of the fact with a view to renewing operations on 
the house. There is a touch of humor in the letter 
when, after stating that now that the money had been 
found, he asks the question, "Where shall we find 
L 'Enfant?" 

Mr. W. W. Corcoran, who lately departed this life 
in the city of Washington full of years and of honor, 
and who cherished to the last an affectionate interest 
in Georgetown, which was the place of his birth and 
the home of his childhood, had a very distinct recollec- 
tion of the personal appearance of L 'Enfant, the latter 
having been a frequent visitor at his father's house. 
He described him to me as a tall, erect man, fully six 
feet in height, finely proportioned, nose prominent, of 
military bearing, courtly air and polite manners, his 
figure usually enveloped in a long overcoat and sur- 
mounted by a bell-crowned hat— a man who would 
attract attention in any assembly. The late John H. 
B. Latrobe of Baltimore, who was the son of Benjamin 
H. Latrobe, at one time architect of the Capitol and at 
another surveyor of Washington, also had a clear rec- 
ollection of Major L 'Enfant and his description of him 
agreed with Mr. Corcoran 's. All accounts concur in 



98 Old Georgetown. 

depicting the major as a man of honorable and high 
spirit and of great abilities in his profession, but im- 
pulsive, and, as General Washington said of him, "of 
untoward disposition." 

Under date of September 11, 1789, Major L 'Enfant 
wrote to the President in New York as follows : 

"The late determination of Congress to lay the foundation 
of a city, which is to become the capital of this vast empire, 
offers so great an occasion of acquiring reputation to whoever 
may he appointed to conduct the execution of the business 
that your excellency will not be surprised that my ambition 
and the desire I have of becoming a useful citizen should lead 
me to wish a share in the undertaking. 

"No nation, perhaps, had ever before the opportunity of- 
fered them of deliberately deciding on the spot where their 
capital city should be fixed or of combining every necessary 
consideration in the choice of situation, and although the 
means now within the power of the country are not such as 
to pursue the design to any great extent it will be obvious 
that the plan should be drawn on such a scale as to leave 
room for that aggrandizement and embellishment which the 
increase of the wealth of the nation will permit it to pursue 
at any period, however remote. Viewing the matter in this 
light I am fully sensible of the extent of the undertaking, and 
under the hope of a continuance of the indulgence you have 
hitherto honored me with I now presume to solicit the favor 
of being employed in this business. 

"And now that I am addressing your excellency I will 
avail myself of the occasion to call to your attention an object 
of at least equal importance to the dignity of the nation and 
in which her quiet and prosperity are intimately connected — 
I mean the protection of the seacoast of the United States — 
this has hitherto been left to the individual states and has 
been so totally neglected as to endanger the peace of the 
Union, for it is certain that any insult offered on that side 
(and there is nothing to prevent), however immaterial it 
might be in its local effect, would degrade the nation and do 



Old Georgetown. 99 

more injury to its political interests than a much greater 
degradation on her inland frontiers ; from these considera- 
tions I should argue the necessity of the different bays and 
seaports being fortified at the expense of the Union in order 
that one general and uniform system may prevail throughout, 
that being as necessary as an uniformity in the discipline of 
the troops to whom they may be intrusted. 

''I flatter myself your excellency will excuse the freedom 
with which I impart to you my ideas on this subject. Indeed 
my confidence in this business arises in a great measure from 
a persuasion that the subject has already engaged your at- 
tention. Having had the honor to belong to the corps of 
engineers, acting under your orders during the late war and 
being the only officer of that corps remaining on the conti- 
nent, I must confess I have long flattered myself with the 
hope of a reappointment, a hope which was encouraged by 
several of the individuals of the former Congress — and now 
when the establishment of a truly federal government renders 
every post under it more desirable I view the appointment of 
engineer to the United States as the one which could possibly 
be most gratifying to my wishes, and though the necessity of 
such an officer to superintend and direct the fortifications 
necessary to the United States is sufficiently apparent, the 
advantages to be derived from the appointment will appear 
more striking when it is considered that the sciences of mili- 
tary and civil architecture are so connected as to render an 
engagement equally serviceable in time of peace as in war, by 
the employment of his abilities in the internal improvements 
of the country. 

''Not to intrude any longer on your patience, and without 
entering on any particulars relating to my private circum- 
stances, of which I believe you are sufficiently informed, I 
shall conclude by assuring you that, ever animated as I have 
been with a desire to merit your good opinion, nothing will 
be wanting to complete my happiness if the remembrance of 
my former services, connected with a variety of peculiar cir- 
cumstances during fourteen years' residence in this country, 



lOO Old Georgetown. 

can plead with your excellency in support of the favor I 
solicit." 

The Establishment of the National Capital Causes 
Distress to the Landowners. 

The arrangement effected by President Washington 
with the proprietors of the land to be included within 
the limits of the "Federal City," provided that when 
it was laid out, upon such plan as the President might 
approve, the streets and such other portions of the 
land as might be selected by the Federal authorities, 
should belong to the United States; and seventeen 
selections were made, called ''Appropriations" or 
"Reservations." It further provided that as to the 
"residue of the lots," that is the lots available for 
private buildings, an equal division of them should 
be made between the Federal authorities and the 
proprietors. 

The fact that the establishment and maintenance of 
the national capital was regarded as in every sense a 
national undertaking and not one of which the people 
of the city were to be compelled to largely bear the 
burdens is shown by the above letter and b}^ one which 
I will now read, written by Daniel Carroll of Dudding- 
ton, one of the original proprietors of the land in the 
city of AVashington, and which was written in reply 
to a communication of Henry J. Brent, dated July 24, 
1837, propounding an inquiry as to the manner of the 
relinquishment of right in the streets of the city to the 
general government. Mr. Carroll's reply was as fol- 
lows: 

"In answer to yours, I fear that the deeds will fully ex- 
press the relinquishment of right in the streets to the govern- 
ment. I nevertheless perfectly remember that the general 
opinion was that so great was the gift that the citizens would 



Old Georgetown. lOi 

never be subject to taxation for the improvement of the streets 
— having relinquished every alternate lot to the government. 
Indeed, some were so wild as to suppose the donation was so 
great the government might pave the streets with ingots of 
gold or silver. After nearly a half century the result is now 
fully known; the unfortunate proprietors are generally 
brought to ruin, and some with scarcely enough to buy daily 
food for their families. This subject is so truly frightful to 
me that I hate to think of it, much less to write of it. ' ' 

All the writers who have considered the consequences 
of the establishment of the city of Washington on the 
fortunes of the land owners in the city have assumed 
that the conversion of their farms into city lots was 
attended with an extraordinary addition to their wealth ; 
on the contrary, the fact is that owing to the destruc- 
tion of the land for farming purposes and the lack of 
demand for the lots into which the farms had been 
divided, coupled with increased taxation, which they 
were unable to pay, the land owners were in reality in 
most instances seriously embarrassed, and many of 
them, as stated by Mr. Carroll, were brought to bank- 
ruptcy and ruin. 

David Bumes, one of the largest of these owners, 
wrote to the commissioners of the city on the fourth of 
November, 1792, making a strong appeal for advances 
on account of the portion of his lands which had been 
taken for public purposes, stating that he was badly 
circumstanced and that his house was full of creditors. 

His daughter and heiress, Marcia, who married Gen- 
eral John P. Van Ness, reaped some of the advantages 
of it during her brief life, but the location of the federal 
city upon his lands destroyed his homely but comfor- 
table farm life, and produced for Mr. Burnes, until the 
time of his death in 1799, only dividends of vexation 
and distress. 



102 Old Georgetoxsm. 

It is commonly supposed that the reason why the 
attractive plateau east of the Capitol did not show much 
progress after the city was laid out, and the tide of 
improvement, such as it was, took other directions, 
was because of the high prices at which Mr, Carroll 
and other owners held their lots, but they could not 
have controlled the situation, even if they had desired 
to do so, as the government was the owner of one half 
of the lots. The fact is that they did everything in 
their power to induce the erection of buildings and the 
making of investments in that section. They placed 
moderate prices upon their lots and gave leases for 
ninety-nine years, subject to the payment of an annual 
rent which amounted only to 6 per centum per annum 
upon such prices, and with a privilege of purchase at 
any time during the term at the oiiginal fixed price. 
The columns of the press of other cities show that Mr. 
Carroll offered to donate whole sides of squares in 
eligible situations to persons who would undertake to 
build, but could prevail on no one to accept. 

Some of the characters and the subjects which have 
been mentioned deserve a fuller notice and much more 
might be written upon numerous other interesting 
phases of the early history of the town, but this must 
be reserved for a future occasion, as this paper has 
been extended far beyond the limits proper for the 
present one. 

It will be brought to a close with the story of an 
humble but much respected inhabitant of the town, 
upwards of one hundred years ago. 

The Story of Yarrah. 

In the early part of the last century there was living 
in Georgetown an African by the name of Yarrah or 



Old Georgetown. I03 

Yarrow, who was treated with great kindness by the 
people of the town generally, on account of the sym- 
pathy excited by his peculiar history. As told by Gen- 
eral Mason of Analostan Island to Warden m 1811, and 
given by the latter in his sketch of the District pub- 
lished in Paris in 1816, it exhibits Yarrow as possessed 
in an extraordinary degree of the qualities which sur- 
mount adversity. Before the Revolutionary War Yar- 
row was brought from Africa to the United States, and 
there sold as a slave to a family who lived near George- 
town, on the banks of the Potomac. His master gave 
him his freedom as a reward after many years of hard 
labor and faithful service. Yarrow resolved to be 
independent; he toiled late and early and in the course 
of a few years he accumulated one hundred dollars. 
This sum was placed by Yarrow in the hands of a mer- 
chant, and was all lost through his insolvency and 
death. Yarrow was much affected by the loss of his 
fortune; old age was coming on and strength was fail- 
ing; but he still cherished the hope of independence. 
He 'worked at fixed wages during the day, and in the 
evening made nets, baskets and other articles for sale. 
In a few years Yarrow was again rich-he had ac- 
quired another hundred dollars. This was entrusted to 
another merchant and lost through his bankruptcy. 
Yarrow was sad and depressed, but his habits of indus- 
try led him still to persevere in the effort to become 
independent before the day when he could no longer 
work. He again worked industriously and unremit- 
tingly for several years and then found himself in the 
possession of another and larger fortune-two hundred 
dollars. A friend explained to him the nature of a 
bank, and he invested his money in shares of the Bank 
of Columbia, in his own name. The bank at this time 
was prosperous; Yarrow's necessities were not great, 



104 Old Georgetown. 

and it is said that his dividends afforded him a com- 
fortable support. Although upwards of eighty years 
of age, he is described as walking erect and being active, 
cheerful and good natured. On Christmas his great 
delight was to fire a gun under the windows of the 
families who were his friends, which was intended as 
a signal for his dram. AVhen young he was one of the 
best swimmers ever seen in the Potomac, and even when 
his muscles were stiffened by age he still found pleasure 
in the exercise. He was fond of conversation and often 
related the story of his life, in broken language, as 
follows : 

"Olde ]\Iassa been tink he got all de work out of a Yaro 
bone. He tell a Yaro, go free Yaro ; you been work nuff for 
me; go Mork for you now. Tankee, Massa, Yaro say; sure 
nuff, Yaro go to work for he now. Yaro work a soon-a-late- 
a-hot-a-cold. Sometime he sweat — sometime he blow a finger. 
He get a fipenny bit — eighteen pennee — gib him to ^Nlassa to 
put by — put by a dolla, til come a heap. Oh! poor massa 
take sick — die — Yaro money gone. Oh, Yaro go to work 
again. Get more dolla — work hard — more dolla. Gib him 
now to young massa, he young, he no die. Oh, young massa 
den broke — den go away. Oh, oh, oh ! Yaro old for true now. 
Must work again — worky, worky, get more dolla. Gib him 
dis time to all de massa — all de massa can't die — can't go 
away. Oh, Yaro dolla breed now — every spring — every fall, 
Yaro get dolla." 

In addition to Yarrow's ownership of stock in the 
Bank of Columbia he was able to further increase his 
worldly substance by the acquisition of real estate. In 
the land records of the District there is recorded a deed 
dated Februarj^ 8, 1800, from Francis Deakins, executor 
of William Deakins, to Negro Yarrow, by which the 
west half of lot 217 in Beatty and Hawkins' Addition 



Old Georgetown. 105 

was conveyed to him in fee. The property fronted on 
the south side of Sixth Street, about midway the square 
between Market and Frederick. 

Mr. Balch states in his Reminiscences that Yarrah 
was a Mohammedan from Guinea and that an admir- 
able likness of him was painted by Simpson, an accom- 
plished artist and portrait painter of the town. 



LEJL '10 



Mr /LrX*"^^*''**-^^ ^ L-c^pi^^ 



OLD GEORGETOWN 



(DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA) 



BY 

HUGH T. TAGGART 



Keprinted from the 
Records of the Columbia Historical Society, Vol. 11, 1908 



Press of 

The New era printing Compant 

Lancaster, Pa. 

1908 



